This year, the World Bank told current and prospective employees of Taiwanese nationality they must present Chinese travel documents in order to maintain or pursue employment.
Axios
Date: December 13, 2019
By: Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian
Why it matters: China has recently ramped up its campaign to systematically force Taiwan and its citizens out of the international community. But forcing out its own staff in this way violates World Bank employment principles.
World Bank human resources staff have told Taiwanese nationals that they can only be employed by the World Bank if they have identification documents from the People's Republic of China.
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Taiwanese law prohibits citizens from maintaining dual citizenship with China.
- This means that in order to abide by the policy as relayed by World Bank staff, Taiwanese employees of the World Bank would have to choose between giving up their job, or choosing to become de facto nationals of the People's Republic of China and thus jeopardize their Taiwanese citizenship.
The big picture: Taiwan governs itself but China views the island as part of its sovereign territory. For decades Beijing has waged a highly successful campaign to push Taiwan out of multilateral organizations. [FULL STORY]