Articles from July 2007
Resident Visa Alert-UK TRO
Applicants for resident visas in the UK should note that unlike most other de facto Taiwanese embassies overseas, the Taipei Representative Office in the UK requires a UK criminal background check and a health certificate for resident visa applications in addition to the usual documentary requirements. This includes resident visa applications for white collar workers who are applying on the basis of a work permit. We recommend always calling ahead to your local Taiwanese embassy to check on special requirements they may have.
Taiwan Business Topics, a publication of the American Chamber of Commerce, recently reported that that Chung Hwa Travel Service, Taiwan's consular office in Hong Kong, has been requiring all visa applicants to supply proof of residence in their home country in the form of a driver's license, recent utility bill, or bank statement since 2005.
For more information on immigration and labor issues in Taiwan, please contact Lloyd Roberts at +886-2-2311-2345 ext. 522
Disclaimer: The foregoing information is time sensitive and subject to change at any time.
Categorised in Update. Tagged: Immigration , Labor
P2P Amendments to the Copyright Act Become Law
The Legislative Yuan passed proposed amendments to Taiwan's Copyright Act in June broadening the scope of the definition of copyright infringement to include the provision of software or services for profit that enable the unauthorized public transmission or reproduction of copyrighted works via the internet. The key element of the offense is the inducement of the public to infringe and not any actual infringement by the public.
The amendments, which came into force on 14 July 2007, will, however, have little serious effect on the local market and seem to have passed more to placate concerns raised in the USTR’s annual Special 301 report. The two major illicit file sharing services that spurred the amendments, Kuro and EZPeer, both settled cases with the IFPI in 2005 and now operate legitimately. And it appears that the sites that sprung up to replace them to cater to the local market’s taste for pirated content have set up offshore.
