School meetings rule changes pass
Staff writer, with CNA
The Legislative Yuan yesterday passed amendments mandating that senior-high school students make up at least 8 percent of participants at school management meetings, while also expanding a system through which students can appeal policies that they believe would harm their interests.
The first of the measures, which is to take effect on Oct. 1, was proposed by members of the Taiwan People’s Party and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to give students a greater role in decisions that affect their future.
Although the Senior High School Education Act (高級中等教育法) already requires the attendance of student representatives at school management meetings, it does not set a minimum number or proportion of student participants.
EDITORIAL: Proportionality in policing
An incident on Thursday last week between a police officer and a woman walking in the area behind Jhongli Railway Station in Taoyuan has drawn public attention to proportionality in policing.
The incident ended with a Jhongli Police Precinct officer, surnamed Yeh (葉), wrestling the screaming woman, Chan Hui-ling (詹慧玲), to the sidewalk in a judo maneuver, pressing her face to the ground, and then detaining her for nine hours in the police station.
Chan, a music teacher, had refused to produce her identification card on Yeh’s request after he approached her to do a spot check. The situation quickly deteriorated when Yeh was affronted by an insult that Chan allegedly used against him.
Court revokes decision denying same-sex marriage of Taiwanese, foreigner
Staff writer, with CNA
The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday revoked a decision by a household registration office not to permit a same-sex marriage involving a foreign national from a country in which such marriages are illegal, and proposed alternate legal grounds on which the marriage could be performed.
The Daan District Household Registration Office in Taipei refused to permit the marriage of Taiwanese gay rights activist Chi Chia-wei (祁家威) and his Malaysian partner when they attempted to do so on May 24, 2019.
The office based its decision on Article 46 of the Act Governing the Choice of Law in Civil Matters Involving Foreign Elements (涉外民事法律適用法), which states that “the formation of a marriage is governed by the national law of each party.”
MAC mulls same-sex marriage for Chinese
By Chen Yu-fu and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporter, with staff writer
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) is exploring legal options to allow Taiwanese to marry their Chinese same-sex partners.
The comments on Thursday came after the Judicial Yuan last week said that it aims to amend regulations on same-sex marriages, opening them for Taiwanese and their spouses from countries that do not recognize same-sex marriage.
This would also apply to spouses from Hong Kong and Macau, but not China, the Executive Yuan said.
MAC Deputy Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said that the Council of Grand Justices’ Interpretation No. 748, the basis for same-sex marriage in Taiwan, does not allow for the exclusion of Chinese spouses.