COR Point 70 Right to Privacy (ICCPR Article 17)
Statistics provided in the State report indicate that more women are fined for adultery than men. The criminalization of adultery in Article 239 of the Criminal Code creates substantive gender inequality and should be abolished as soon as possible. However, the government has repeatedly said in public meetings or in statements to the news media that it will not consider decriminalization of adultery until there is a consensus in public opinion regardless of the intense advocation by the Experts to decriminalize and in disregard of the substantive harm caused to Taiwan women by the criminalization of adultery.
In a joint news conference held March 19, 2013, the Awakening Foundation and Legislator Yu Mei-nu announced the initiation of a campaign to decriminalize adultery. This announcement received widespread support from many domestic legal scholars, judges, lawyers and social movement organizations. The bill, the first ever proposed in the Legislative Yuan to revoke the criminal penalty for adultery, was approved in its first reading in April 2013, but the Executive Yuan continued to delay and has neither taken new action or submitted any alternate bills.
On November 28, 2012, the Ministry of Justice held a public hearing during which experts and scholars from all circles in society were invited to express their views. However, this single and poorly publicized seminar was unable to realize effective dialogue or form any consensus. Although the hearing did not reach a conclusion to decriminalize adultery, it also did not reach a conclusion that “adultery should not be decriminalized” and the MOJ therefore should not be allowed to use this hearing as a basis to refuse to fulfil its human rights obligations.133
During the past four years, the MOJ has commissioned two public opinion surveys using on-line survey platforms which are not scientifically rigorous as its main response to this campaign. The MOJ continuously conflates the concepts of “the decriminalization of adultery” with “there should not be any legal consequences for adultery” to deliberately confuse the three different levels of responsibility in criminal law, civil law and morality and thus avoid discussion of existing provisions and protections in civil law. The MOJ has only a few public opinion surveys on this issue are rare. Some are online surveys which lack objectivity and fairness but the MOJ nonetheless uses their untrustworthy data to claim that “public opinion shows that the time (for decriminalization of adultery) has not yet mature since there is no social consensus.”
Compared to the dereliction of duty and avoidance of responsibility on the part of government agencies, civil society organizations (CSOs) have continued to actively promote the decriminalization of adultery. In February 2015, the South Korean Constitutional Court issued its verdict that Article 241 of that country’s criminal code on the crime of adultery was unconstitutional and reignited the calls by CSOs that our country should also decriminalize adultery. However, when asked by reporters on whether Taiwan should follow suit, MOJ spokesmen continued to use the claim that “a social consensus is lacking” as their only response and thereby persisted in avoiding to take proper responsibility.
We demand that the State should fulfil its responsibility and promptly hold public hearings on the question of decriminalization of adultery and provide a research report on the current situation regarding the criminalization of adultery in Taiwan.
- The MOJ’s position on the decriminalization of adultery is expressed fully in a statement submitted by the MOJ to the Legislative Yuan on January 14, 2016. Besides presenting pro and con arguments, the MAJ said Taiwan was joined in criminalization of adultery by 23 of 50 states in the United States of America and by other countries such as Saudi Arabia, India, Indonesia, Cambodia, Libya, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria, Iran, Egypt and the Sudan. The statement noted that Germany, Japan, France, Italy, Austria, South Korea, Sweden, Denmark and the People’s Republic of China had abolished criminal penalties for adultery. the MAJ said that the purpose of Article 239 was to “maintain the happiness and harmony of family life and ensure the purity of sexual relations between husband and wife and a healthy family system with one husband and one wife.” The MAJ cited commissioned and on-line opinion polls as evidence that a majority of Taiwan citizens opposed decriminalization and in support of its stance to approach the issue “cautiously.” http://lci.ly.gov.tw/LyLCEW/agenda1/02/pdf/09/01/07/LCEWA01_090107_00166.pdf.