Dual citizenship - ABT

Legal Dual Nationality
1

Hi! I have a question I was hoping someone could answer for me.

BACKGROUND:

I am an ABT. I was born (after 1985) in the US making me a US citizen. My family moved to Taiwan when I was a kid and I lived and went to school there for a year. During that time my parents applied a Taiwan passport for me making me a dual citizen.

But that Taiwan passport expired a long time ago and I never renewed it again. So now every time I go back to Taiwan I enter with my US passport.

Right now I am considering moving back to Taiwan for work, but the military conscription is my biggest concern.

My question is is it still possible for me to get drafted? If so what should I do in this situation to avoid military conscription?

Thanks!

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[quote=“reallysoftsweater”]Hi! I have a question I was hoping someone could answer for me.

BACKGROUND:

I am an ABT. I was born (after 1985) in the US making me a US citizen. My family moved to Taiwan when I was a kid and I lived and went to school there for a year. During that time my parents applied a Taiwan
passport for me making my a dual citizen.

But that Taiwan passport expired a long time ago and I never renewed it again. So now every time I go back to Taiwan I enter with my US passport.

Right now I am considering moving back to Taiwan for work, but the military conscription is my biggest concern.

My question is is it still possible for me to get drafted? If so what should I do in this situation to avoid military conscription?

Thanks![/quote]

What is an ABT? Do you mean èŻćƒ‘?

(1) You do not become a citizen by applying for a passport. Countless of ROC citizens never applied for a passport. Under the Republic of China Nationality Act you have been a national from birth as your parents are nationals - regardless of what form of identification or passport you use.

(2) That being said, having an invalid passport will not affect your status as a ROC citizen and you will most definitely be subject to the draft.

(3) Not maintaining household registration does not help you either.

1 Like
4

As an America Born Taiwanese after 1985, you will not have the benefit of doing 4-month VISA runs. So your real options to avoid being drafted are:

  1. Give up Taiwanese citizenship and just apply for a work VISA.
  2. Have a medical reason to be excused from service.
  3. The research alternative service for expatriates is still available. If you have a masters in the applicable field and don’t mind being tied down to a company for 3 years, then you can consider doing that. A co-worker of mine is doing it.

By the way, if you can’t speak Mandarin well, it’s could be tough for you. Sometimes even if you are excused, you might still have to serve for a rather pointless 21 days. During which you will mostly be doing nothing or cleaning and jogging, while your COs try very hard not to have you kill yourself.

5

Draft age male citizens cannot give up ROC citizenship before having completed the service.

6

I believe draft age male citizens with Overseas Chinese Identification are able to give up their ROC citizenship (the more accurate term is National with Household Registration).

In regards to OP’s original question, because your family applied for Household Registration (and subsequent ROC ID and ROC passport) for you when you were little, you are now designated as a National with Household Registration (NWHR) for LIFE, even if your household registration is suspended after two years. NWHRs are subjected to conscription laws. Nationals without Household Registration (NWOHR) are not subjected to conscription laws.

If you had not yet applied for an Overseas Chinese Identification, you can enter enter Taiwan with your US passport without problems, as you are somehow hidden from the system (seems odd to me, don’t know why). If you want to work in Taiwan, once you apply for an ARC, they will see that you have Household Registration (and a ROC ID number). They will request you apply for an Overseas Chinese Identification and give you a TARC, not an ARC. Once you apply for Overseas Chinese Identification, you are now somehow truly subjected to conscription laws. So now, if you enter Taiwan with a US passport, you must have your Overseas Chinese ID with you or they won’t let you in/out. For NWHRs to work in Taiwan without conscription, the only way is if you renounce your ROC nationality. I am renouncing mine.

You wouldn’t have this problem if your parents didn’t apply for Household Registration on your behalf when you were little. If you didn’t have Household Registration, you would then get your ARC and work in Taiwan like any other foreigner. You can still apply for Household Registration after 36 and gain full citizenship status without having to serve in the military. This is a loophole, I suppose.

In reflection, Taiwan laws try their best to be fair. However, there are just several things that are much more complicated than necessary, like the above. One reason for slow progress is that people do not dare bring up these problems to their superiors (obey and follow is the default attitude) and general resistance of old guards to change their way of thinking (because they used to obey, now they are now on power trips and refuse to admit mistakes or change).

7

I thought the TARC was only for NWOHR. It’s essentially an open work permit and right of abode until you establish the time period of residence required to apply for a ROC ID. OP (whose post is 3 years old) already has a ROC ID. They won’t issue him with a TARC, the TECO will issue him with a passport that has his ID number in it and the household registration office he is registered at in Taiwan will issue him with an ID card. I’m very happy to be corrected on this - brains trust.

Where are you at with this process? Apparently, males of draft age who are subject to the conscription laws are not allowed to renounce ROC nationality. If they are processing your renunciation for you it would seem that this is not the case. Keep us updated on this.
Edit:
Ok, saw your post in another thread that Taiwanese males of draft age can give up ROC nationality if they have Overseas Chinese Identification. What if you don’t have this? What do you need to apply for it? I think I read somewhere that the Taiwanese government made it a lot more difficult to obtain this in recent years?

I think you’ve pretty accurately summed up a very large root of a lot of Taiwan’s main problems.

8

If you have ROC parents, you are a national, no matter what. I know someone who is a national and never had Household Registration (thus he is a NWOHR) and was issued an ARC, not a TARC. Because he never had a Household Registration, a ROC ID, or a Taiwanese Passport, the NIA saw him purely as a foreigner. On the other hand, I have an expired Household Registration, expired National ID Card (but I do have an ID number), and expired Taiwanese Passport. I’m not 100% sure whether I’m a NWHR or NWOHR, but I believe the former. I was not allowed to get an ARC. I believe I will get a TARC. I will confirm this and edit this later if necessary.

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Yeah but PRC nationals are defined as ROC nationals too, according to the law :wink:
The main thing is, did they go in with their birth certificate and parents’ ROC ID to get properly registered? If not then they are not in the system as such. They’re what’s termed in informal parlance as 黑戶 and for all practical intents and purposes they are a foreigner.

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Ah, so that’s what it’s called: 黑戶. There has to be tens of thousands of ROC parents who have children abroad. These children were born and raised in a foreign country and never “registered” in Taiwan. They may visit Taiwan a few times in their youth on a foreign passport. Many may even work in Taiwan on an ARC on a foreign passport. All of these people are then 黑戶?

Of these tens of thousands of parents, a few unwitting parents will apply for Household Registration for their sons. Now, these registered males cannot work in Taiwan (at ages 19-36) without being conscripted. They must renounce their ROC nationality to avoid conscription. In the meantime, unregistered draft-age males (or 黑戶 males) can work in Taiwan on an ARC. They can apply for Household Registration at age 37 and become full ROC citizens


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11173 is right: you are not automatically a Taiwanese national just because you have ROC parents (though I think it makes you automatically eligible). To be a national, your parents must register you (and their marriage, before you’re 20). I’m pretty sure you cannot get an TARC–that’s for people awaiting nationality (I had one while I waited to get my ID number). In your case, since you have an ID number, you would probably just get a new national ID card.

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Your information is wrong. Perhaps your concept is correct just wrong wording. First, you are definitely automatically a ROC National (you possess ćœ‹ç±) if one of your parents is an ROC National. A quick read on Wikipedia (Taiwanese nationality law - Wikipedia) will tell you this. I have also been told this by clerks at the Dept. of Household Registration (æˆ¶æ”żćž), NIA (移民çœČ), and OCAC (ćƒ‘ć‹™ć§”ć“Ąæœƒ). ROC Nationals are classified as Nationals with Household Registration (NWHR; whether expired or unexpired) or Nationals Without Household Registration (NWOHR). NWHRs can have a valid or expired ROC ID.

I am an Overseas Chinese, so I believe I will get a TARC? I just want the TARC (or ARC) to work in Taiwan (I already have a work permit from my employer); I don’t necessarily want to gain a new ROC ID. However, I believe I’m automatically enrolled in the process now? I’m not sure actually, let you guys know later.

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If you are a 19-36 male NWHR without Overseas ID, you cannot renounce your ROC nationality. To qualify for Overseas Chinese ID, read this law Overseas Community Affairs Council, Republic of China (Taiwan) -Content. In short, you have to establish permanent residency in another country. There may be other details I’m missing. To get my Overseas Chinese ID, I went to the OCAC (ćƒ‘ć‹™ć§”ć“Ąæœƒ) in Taipei and gave them 1) My expired Taiwanese passport, 2) my current U.S. passport, and 3) official Entry/Exit dates (obtained from the NIA for 100NT, 5 min processing). 200NT/copy of the ID. I got 2. It takes them 4 hours to process (but they did it in 1 hour for me).

14

I think it may be important to consider the wording in all of this. Nationality is not really automatic–it requires action on the part of a parent. When I was born, my mother never registered me or my sister, so we were not in any way nationals until she did. This was a long, complicated process which started with getting and overseas Taiwanese passport (in the US). Later, I went to Taiwan and got my
TARC. Then, after a year, I applied for a national ID card and a new passport with that national ID number (which made me a NWHR). I was not considered a NWOHR UNTIL I got the overseas passport–I was just a foreigner (with the eligibility to become Taiwanese through my mother–but even that isn’t always true for everyone–if I had been born a year earlier, I wouldn’t have qualified).

Now, if you at some point in your life, you possessed a national ID number, you are a national through and through. However, I have heard there is some kind of stamp or something you can get which designates you as an “overseas” Taiwanese, and keeps you from having to serve if the military (if you are a male). This is something else entirely.

So complicated, right?

15

I think that your concept of nationality is not quite correct. Nationality is something that is defined by in law, not by the paperwork in the system. Just because children of parents who are ROC nationals are not registered by their parents with the Taiwanese government does not mean that they do not possess äž­èŻæ°‘ćœ‹ - they most definitely do, and if they have all of the required documents it is a very simple peocess to establish this fact in the system and get an ID number, passport and ID card. This is not the same thing as obtaining nationality which you imply it is. They already aquired nationality at birth.

16

It is most certainly not a simple process to get established in the system, especially after the age of 20, and this process IS very often referred to as “obtaining” or “reclaiming” nationality. Absolutely none of this is automatic. Anyone born after 1980 to at least one ROC national CAN be registered, eventually (so in this respect, yes, they are nationals at birth, but this doesn’t mean anything practically), but it requires first being categorized as an overseas national (you get an overseas ROC passport), then staying in Taiwan on a TARC for a year AND THEN applying for a national ID number. Furthermore, having a Taiwanese parent alone is NOT enough to be considered a national for everyone. Until relatively recently, mixed children of Taiwanese women were NEVER granted nationality, and presently, people born before 1980 would have to renounce other existing nationality before taking a Taiwanese national ID number (the rules around this might be a bit more complicated that this).

Now, if the ROC parents of someone under the age of 20 registers them, then yes, everything is simpler. However, it still requires action on the part of the parents, wherever they happen to be.

17

Ah, really? I knew the part where mixed children of Taiwanese mothers born before 1980 aren’t able to, but I thought if you had at least one parent (especially the father) with hukou in the Taiwan area who could present a ROC passport, national ID card or another form of proof of ROC nationality, it was pretty much automatic. Had no idea things got a lot harder after you reach the age of majority, why is that so? But it makes sense then that for children of Taiwanese mothers the birth year is 1980 or after, because they changed the law in the year 2000 and the age of majority is 20 years.

18

Wording is important, so let’s get it correct. You most definitely automatically have Nationality if you are born of one or both (depending on specifics) ROC parents; this is how the law was written. Again, read the Wiki link I gave you. In addition, clerks at the Dept. of Household Registration (æˆ¶æ”żćž), NIA (移民çœČ), and OCAC (ćƒ‘ć‹™ć§”ć“Ąæœƒ) told me this. I don’t necessarily agree with this confusing wording, but it is the correct wording. In short, “nationals” are just people of ROC/Chinese parents (or something). NWHRs are " Taiwanese citizens." NWOHRs are simply “nationals” (people of ROC/Chinese descent) that don’t have citizenship. (Rant: The reason the word “nationality” is meaningless in Taiwan and the word “citizenship” doesn’t even exist is ALL because of PRC fuckery, I’m guessing). Anyway, in the end, it is the actual documentation you obtain (overseas passports, Taiwanese passports, ARC, TARC, household registration, ROC ID, Overseas Chinese ID, etc.) that defines your civil status.

You were always an NWOHR. According to law, you were always a “national.” To get an overseas passport, you must first prove you are indeed a “national”, thus you had to go through a long process that involved your patents birth certificates/ID’s (or whatnot, I’m not familiar with this process). After getting your passport, I guess you are now an “official” or “recognized” NWOHR or whatever you want to call it. Again, this is just wording.

1 Like
19

Bookmarked for future reference. Good post.

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What you are saying is mostly not wrong, but if you wish you use Wikipedia as your point of legal reference (which is not totally dumb, given the dearth of accurate practical information out there), the key word in the part that defines the features of nationality is “qualify”. This should not be ignored.

The child of one or two ROC parents born after 1980 might QUALIFY for nationality, but is not considered a NWOHR until something is done to put that person in the system. (And no, I was most certainly NOT always a NWOHR because when I was born–before 2000–the mixed children of ROC women didn’t qualify AND my parents never registered their marriage in Taiwan.) That means that someone who has never been registered can enter Taiwan on their non-Taiwanese passport, get an ARC and live just like a foreigner would. Their Taiwanese nationality effectively does not exist and they would enjoy NONE of the rights of ANY level of national. (This is the case for many overseas Taiwanese who come back to Taiwan to work or study, but don’t want serve army time, or go through the headache of going through all the paperwork, which is not a small process.)

However, a NWOHR in the system would most likely not be able to get an ARC–they would get a TARC instead.

You might automatically QUALIFY for nationality if you are born to one or two ROC parents after 1980, but this definition is mostly useless IN PRACTICE unless something is done. This point cannot be downplayed, as it’s really not easy to get into the system, especially as an adult.

The real difference between NWHRs and NWOHRs is that NWOHRs have a national ID number. This is also an important distinction because that ID number stays with you for the duration of your life–it is your undeniable proof of your tie to Taiwan.

***EDIT: I want to add another interesting piece of information which does give more evidence of this idea that “nationality is automatic”, though it does make things slightly more complicated.

Another poster in another thread wrote that he had never applied for any form of Taiwanese nationality. He entered Taiwan on his foreign passport and worked on an ARC. HOWEVER, when he made an application for an APRC, he was told he didn’t qualify BECAUSE HIS MOTHER was a Taiwanese national and thus, so was he.

This is pretty interesting. I kind of wonder when exactly this concept of automatic nationality gets pulled out. Does this mean that if you break the law, can you suddenly learn you are in fact a national and get processed as such, or does it mean you will be deported as a foreigner? And what about people who don’t have the documentation to register themselves as adults (there are lots of them), but want to apply for residency after many years as a foreigner? Will they be refused the right to stay AS nationals?! (Taiwanese law is not really known for having many loopholes
)

I’d be curious to know if other people have stories about this.