Taiwan is launching a redesigned passport on Monday (January 11), with the aim of avoiding confusion with China in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and while Beijing intensifies its efforts to assert its sovereignty.
The new passport gives greater emphasis to the name of the day-to-day of the island.
The existing ones have “Republic of China”, their formal name, written in large English font at the top, with “Taiwan” printed at the bottom.
The new passport expands the word “Taiwan” in English and removes “Republic of China” – although that name remains in Chinese and in a small English font around the national emblem.
During the early stages of the global health crisis, Taiwan says that some of its citizens were mistaken for Chinese citizens.
And they were sometimes unfairly subject to the same entry bans when the number of cases of the virus was well under control in Taiwan.
Chen Li-ting is one of the first candidates for the new passport:
“I thought that would happen sooner or later. That is, sooner or later the word ‘Taiwan’ would appear more and more. And in the future, ‘Republic of China’ will disappear.”
China said that no matter what Taiwan’s citation of “small movements” would not change the fact that Taiwan was an inseparable part of China.
China claims democratic Taiwan as its sovereign territory and says it only has the right to speak for the island internationally.
Video transcription
– Taiwan is launching a redesigned passport on Monday, with the aim of avoiding confusion with China in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and while Beijing intensifies its efforts to assert its sovereignty. The new passport gives greater emphasis to the name of the day-to-day of the island. The existing ones have “Republic of China”, their formal name written in large English font at the top, with “Taiwan” printed at the bottom. The new passport expands the word “Taiwan” in English and removes “Republic of China”, although that name remains in Chinese and in a small English font around the national emblem.
During the early stages of the global health crisis, Taiwan says that some of its citizens were mistaken for Chinese citizens. And they were sometimes unfairly subject to the same entry bans when the number of cases of the virus was well under control in Taiwan. Chen Li-ting is one of the first candidates for the new passport.
– I thought that would happen sooner or later. That is, sooner or later, the word “Taiwan” would appear more and more. And in the future, the “Republic of China” will disappear.
[NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]
– China said that no matter what, in quotation marks, “small movements” made by Taiwan, that would not change the fact that Taiwan was an inseparable part of China. China claims democratic Taiwan as its sovereign territory and says it only has the right to speak for the island internationally.