00:00A Chinese social media influencer living in Taiwan has had her residency revoked.
00:06Authorities say she poses a national security threat because of pro-unification videos she
00:11posted online.
00:12Cadence Caronta has been following this story and joins us now from our newsroom.
00:17Cadence, how is the government able to take away someone's residency like this?
00:22Yeah, so as you said, this is about a Chinese influencer known as Yaya in Taiwan.
00:29She has a Taiwanese residency card because she's married to a Taiwanese citizen and she
00:34lives in Taiwan.
00:35But importantly, she's not a Taiwanese citizen.
00:38And Taiwan's Immigration Bureau has said that she's posted videos on social media advocating
00:43for the unification of China and Taiwan with the use of force.
00:48And if you look at her social media, a lot of her videos are about cross-strait issues
00:52and unification.
00:53Let's take a look at one of those videos.
00:55So, it's videos like this that have worried authorities here.
01:23Taiwan's Immigration Bureau has revoked her residency and it says she will have to leave
01:27Taiwan and she won't be able to apply for another residency card for five years.
01:32Today, this is what one Taiwanese official said about the decision.
01:59So why is this controversial?
02:01The influencer says that if she can't say what she wants to online, then what is the
02:04meaning of free speech in Taiwan?
02:07And she also says that she lives in Taiwan, so no one wants peace more than her between
02:12the two sides.
02:13The government is constantly trying to combat what they say is Chinese propaganda and infiltration
02:18of Taiwan.
02:20And this just highlights what they have to balance between trying to maintain freedom
02:25of speech and trying to protect their own sovereignty.
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