GEIS-新闻详情

Faster clearance for Singaporeans visiting Taiwan with access to airport e-gates

2023-07-28 00:00:00.0 海峡时报-亚洲原网页

SINGAPORE – Singapore passport holders visiting Taiwan will from Thursday be allowed to use the e-gates at the island’s airports for speedier immigration clearance, said Taiwan’s Interior Ministry.

Travellers will first have to register at the immigration counters with their passports and have photos of their faces taken and fingerprints recorded.

According to Taiwan’s National Immigration Agency, Singapore is the sixth country – after the United States, South Korea, Australia, Italy and Germany – whose citizens will be allowed to use the e-gates at immigration.

Previously, the e-gates could be used only by Taiwan passport holders and foreigners who hold residency status on the island.

Taiwan’s Deputy Interior Minister Wu Jung-hui said on Thursday that Singaporeans aged 12 and above who are at least 140cm tall, holding biometric passports with at least six months’ validity and have no prior criminal convictions on the island will be allowed to use the e-gates.

A ceremony to mark the start of this privilege for Singaporean travellers was held on Thursday evening in Taipei. Mr Yip Wei Kiat, the Trade Representative of the Singapore Trade Office in Taipei, attended the event.

Mr Wu said this latest move reciprocates Singapore’s decision to extend usage of its automated immigration lanes to Taiwan passport holders in April – the island is now one of 51 jurisdictions whose passport holders are granted this access.

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Singapore’s Immigration and Checkpoints Authority said in April that it aims to make automated immigration clearance the norm at the country’s airport and land checkpoints.

It expects 95 per cent of all arrivals at Singapore Changi Airport to be cleared through the automated lanes by the first quarter of 2024.

Taiwan is a popular tourist destination for travellers from Singapore, with 460,000 registered visitors to the island in 2019, before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to the Taiwan Tourism Bureau in Singapore, almost 160,000 Singaporeans visited Taiwan from January to May 2023, more than 90 per cent of the pre-pandemic figures in 2019.

In terms of the number of travellers from South-east Asia visiting Taiwan, Singaporeans are the fourth-largest group, after those from Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.