Taiwan News
Date: 2019/03/08 
By:  Central News Agency

Travelers at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport. (By Central News Agency)

A program that makes it easier for tour groups from certain Southeast Asian countries to visit Taiwan has been tightened after it was used in December to get more than 100 Vietnamese into Taiwan to work rather than travel, the Tourism Bureau said Friday.

The bureau said the program, which made it more convenient for citizens of Indonesia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and India to visit Taiwan, will suspend partnerships with foreign travel agencies for two months should three or more members of group tours they arrange overstay their visa in Taiwan or go unaccounted for.

If the number reaches six, the bureau said, those agencies will be removed from the program, said bureau official Chen Pei-chen (陳佩岑).

The restrictions came after 152 Vietnamese tourists –23 of whom arrived in Taiwan in one tour group on Dec. 21 and 129 who came in three groups on Dec. 23 — went missing soon after arriving in Taiwan.    [FULL  STORY]