Stranded across the Taiwan Strait

By Caroline Gluck In Taipei

More than 100 women sit glumly on thin mattresses, almost shoulder to shoulder, as I peer through iron bars to get a glimpse of what has been their home for the past few months.

Conditions in Hsinchu detention centre are cramped

They are locked inside the room for most of the day.

The women are among more than 1,000 inmates at Taiwan's Hsinchu Detention Centre for mainland Chinese - a former military camp in northern Taiwan which is now a holding place for illegal Chinese migrants.

No more than 840 inmates should be kept here, but the holding centre, one of three in Taiwan, is overcrowded, and currently houses 1,120 women.

The Taiwanese authorities say that is because for the past three months, China has stopped taking back its nationals.

According to government officials, China stopped repatriating its nationals on 12 March, just over a week before Taiwan's presidential election.

Some have not seen their loved ones for months

"We already have too many detainees in these centres", said Taiwan's top China policy maker, Joseph Wu of the Mainland Affairs Council, on a visit to Hsinchu.

"It's overcrowded, even though we try to provide whatever we can in a very humanitarian way.

"We urge the Chinese Government to look at the matter seriously so they can pick them up", he said.

"We hope all these detained Chinese can go back home to their families very soon."

Repatriation delays

Taiwan and China do not have formal relations, and China still regards the island as part of its territory.

There is no official agreement between the two sides on repatriating illegal immigrants; though under an accord signed by the two sides' Red Cross societies over a decade ago, China is meant take back illegal mainland immigrants within 20 days of their detention.

Taiwanese officials say that rarely happens, and the average detention for illegal Chinese migrants is around 115 days.

Holding back tears and speaking with some anger, 27-year-old Hong Yang, originally from China's remote north-eastern province of Heilongjiang, told me she had been stuck at the centre for 16 months.

She had paid 5,000 renminbi (more than $600) to a broker, and was smuggled by boat to Taiwan.

She said two people had died on the journey, and the boat was intercepted by coastguard officials.

Her anger, though, was mainly directed at the authorities in China.

"Our life here, and the food, is good", she said. "The reason this centre is so cramped is that the government in China doesn't send anyone to take us back.

"We're illegal immigrants, but here in Taiwan, the Taiwanese treat us well. I just don't understand why the government in China doesn't take us back. Don't they want us? Do they really turn their backs on us and pretend not to know anything about us?" she said, her voice shaking with emotion.

Mothers and children

Thousands of mainland Chinese try to enter Taiwan illegally every year, looking for jobs and better economic prospects. Most are smuggled by boat; some willingly pay money to brokers; others are forced to make the journey by human trafficking gangs known as snakeheads.

Until a few years ago, the majority of illegal Chinese were men.

But with the shift of much of Taiwan's manufacturing to China, today around 70% of illegal immigrants are women.

"Lots of them work in the prostitution industry," said Lai Hsieh-Yi, director of the Hsinchu detention centre. "Some are kidnapped and forced to work as prostitutes."

One of the saddest sights at Hsinchu detention centre is in one room, where around a dozen women live with their young babies - many of them born at the centre.

Many women even give birth in the centre

Twenty-six-year-old Jiang Lingdan, from Fujian province, has two young children - a son of two, who travelled with her by boat from China, and a seven-month-old daughter. She has been at the centre for the past three months.

She told me her boyfriend, a Taiwanese, had arranged for her to be smuggled over by boat.

"We fell in love in China, though he was married at the time. Now he's divorced", she explained, "We plan to marry when I'm back in China.

"Yes, I have some regrets about coming over. But I don't worry about the future" she said looking at her two youngsters. "Their father will come to take care of them."

Taiwanese officials would like to see a formal agreement with China to try to stem the flow of people trafficked or smuggled from the mainland. A big crackdown on snakehead gangs, launched by the Taiwanese authorities this year, has seen some results.

But as long as the economic disparity between Taiwan and China remains as wide as it is, every year thousands of people are still likely to continue to try to make the risky journey across the Taiwan Strait, hoping to earn good money and find a better life.