The deportation of Filipino city councilor Ricardo Parojinog, coupled with Taiwan’s backdoor agreement with Australia to treat refugees in Nauru detention camps, raise questions about Taiwan’s lack of any coherent refugee policy.

The News Lens
Date: 2018/08/30
By: Brian Hioe, 破土 New Bloom

Photo Credit: Reuters / TPG

Taiwan continues to prove an unfriendly place to refugees, with the deportation of Ricardo “Ardot” Parojinog back to the Philippines late last month. The News Lens reported on August 9 that Parojinog was suspected of drug trafficking in the Philippines and it is possible that he may be killed after he returns, given current Filipino president Rodrigo Duterte’s campaign of state-sanctioned violence and extrajudicial executions against drug dealers and users. Nonetheless, political representatives of the Philippines have thanked Taiwan for deporting Parojinog.

In particular, it has long been alleged by human rights groups that Duterte’s bloody war against drugs is simply a means for Duterte to eliminate potential political opponents and that Duterte is executing potential political threats in the name of combating drug trafficking by all means possible. This could also be the case with Parojinog, a former city councilor, reputed to be the “last man standing” of powerful drug family. A number of other members of Parojinog’s family have been killed in Duterte’s drug war.

However, even if criminal wrongdoing by Parojinog is true, it would still be a large human rights violation to knowingly send a man back to his possible extrajudicial execution. As prison executions have taken place before in the Philippines, this could still occur with Parojinog. Unfortunately, despite protests by some human rights NGOs and despite the fact that the horrors of Duterte’s anti-drug war are well known in Taiwan, Parojinog’s plight failed to become popularly discussed, and there has not been any substantive reaction after he was deported.    [FULL  STORY]