Immigration Act of the ROC enacted in 2003156 differentiates nationals between those who reside in the Taiwan Area and have their permanent residence registered at a household registry on one hand, and those who reside overseas and have the nationality of the ROC on the other. Nationals without registered permanent residence shall be denied or banned from entering Taiwan if they have been suspected to be involved in major crimes (Article 7 (4) of the Immigration Act). They also need permission to enter Taiwan. Banned from entering Taiwan, deportable ROC nationals might fall into the state of de facto statelessness without a country to receive them. In an interview with a Taiwanese official, I was informed that very few Taiwanese in Japan are now nationals without registered permanent residence157. While those from Taiwan who lost their Japanese nationality when the San Francisco Peace Treaty came into effect now hold special permanent resident status, many Taiwanese have general permanent resident status. Since the Japanese government has included people from the PRC and the ROC together as Chinese in the official statistics on alien registration, one may not identify the precise figure of Taiwanese residents who have special/general permanent status. 156 http://law.moj.gov.tw/Eng/Fnews/FnewsContent.asp?msgid=351&msgType=en&keyword=nationality+ 157 An interview conducted with Mr. Kogen Rin of Yokohama Branch of Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Japan on June 5, 2009. Prof. Chen introduces in her book (supra note 4) a real story in which she herself was rejected by her own country Taiwan for lack of registered permanent residence. A distinction thus drawn between nationals with and without registered permanent residence is “justified on the grounds that Taiwan has a limited land area which cannot accommodate all the Chinese nationals residing overseas who wish to make a permanent home in Taiwan”. According to Lee, “[t]his is a complete reversal of the policy prior to 1949, when the Republic of China welcomed and facilitated the entry of their nationals residing overseas, but at that time the Republic of China Government held territory on the mainland now governed by the People’s Republic of China”. Lee, supra note 14, p.217. For an international legal analysis of the restriction on the entry of some nationals to Taiwan, see id., pp.217-220. 58