NIA to revise rules on living permits for foreign spouses

NIA Director General Wu Chen-chi made the remarks at the Home and Nations Committee of the legislature in response to questions by opposition Kuomintang (KMT) lawmaker Chao Erh-chung. Chao criticized the immigration laws that stipulate that foreign spouses of Taiwan citizens must return to their home countries before they apply for re-entry to Taiwan when they overstay their residency permits as inhumane.

Chao cited a case of a foreign spouse living in the offshore island of Kinmen, who was ordered to return to her home country for one year before she could apply for re-entry to Taiwan because she overstayed her residency permit for one year.

Another case occurred on the outlying island of Matsu, involving a spouse who was “relatively luckier” than the first case. The NIA asked her to leave Taiwan for only a short period of time before she applied for re-entry, as she only overstayed her residency permit for three months.

Chao noted that demanding foreign spouses of Taiwanese citizens to leave Taiwan before they apply for re-entry is a practice that dates back to the period when Taiwan was still under martial law. “Such a formality is inhumane and has caused so much inconvenience to the foreign spouses of Taiwanese, as some of them just forgot to apply for the extension of their residency permits,” Chao said.

In response, Wu noted that there are indeed many foreign spouses of local citizens who do not know they should apply for an extension of their residency permits or who do not know when their permits expire. “The NIA has been trying to revise the immigration rules to impose a fine on foreign spouses who overstay their permits or allow an afterward application instead of asking them to leave the country before they apply for re-entry,” Wu said.

However, he did not elaborate when the new immigration rules will be in place.

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