Expat Divorce in Taiwan

[Realgroovychick]

YES - it is possible for two foreigners who got married overseas to get a divorce in Taiwan. I just recently met a Canadian girl who divorced her Australian husband in Taiwan. They were married in Australia. Her ex-husband left her for his Taiwanese co-teacher (ouch!). Anyway, to get divorced they needed to get their marriage licence officially translated into Chinese. They didn't need a household registration but did need their ARCs. It was an uncontested divorce and they didn't even need to turn up for court. Their lawyer arranged everything and the judge signed it. It was pretty easy apparently. She got her divorce certificate translated into English.

Regarding having your divorce "recognized" - the only time you need your divorce recognized is when you want to get married again to prove you are single ie: you need to produce your divorce certificate when you're applying for another marriage licence. That's it.

With few exceptions, married couples can get divorced in any country in the world regardless of their nationality and where they got married - as long as they fulfill the legal requirements of that country. In New Zealand, you need to be legally separated for two years before you can get a divorce, in the Bahamas you can get a divorce in a week! If two Americans got married in New Zealand, they can go to the Bahamas to get a divorce. A legal divorce certificate from any country will render you divorced wherever you go.

[spaint]

Spaint, the OP is talking about two foreign nationals who married outside of Taiwan. Neither of them is a Taiwan citizen.

Was I not clear in demonstrating my understanding of the initial premise? You must think I have my head up my ass. Maybe I posted something asinine elsewhere on the site that gave you a bad impression of me, but I'd hope that the details I provided in my previous message might at least lend a veneer of credibility to my post.

And you're saying that if they were, for example, both South Africans, that a local household registration office in Taiwan would exercise jurisdiction to end their marriage? Really? What are you basing this on? And even if the household registration office here did decide that it had jurisdiction to give them a divorce, are you sure the government of the country where they were married would automatically recognize that divorce as valid?

Yes.
Really.
Personal experience dealing with the HRO. You can ask themselves if you'd like.
Yes, as long as they had no reason to doubt the authenticity of the divorce.

Even if they can get the divorce done through a local household registration office in Taiwan, it seems like an unnecessary extra step, because inevitably they should still want to go through the authorities of their home country to make sure that the divorce is going to be legally recognized there.

No, not necessary. The divorce document in and of itself is sufficient in the case I'm dealing with.

YES - it is possible for two foreigners who got married overseas to get a divorce in Taiwan. I just recently met a Canadian girl who divorced her Australian husband in Taiwan. They were married in Australia. Her ex-husband left her for his Taiwanese co-teacher (ouch!). Anyway, to get divorced they needed to get their marriage licence officially translated into Chinese. They didn't need a household registration but did need their ARCs. It was an uncontested divorce and they didn't even need to turn up for court. Their lawyer arranged everything and the judge signed it. It was pretty easy apparently. She got her divorce certificate translated into English.

I would recommend people try and do it at the household registration office themselves if possible. As I said, I don't know if it'd work for all foreign nationalities but saving the legal fees seems totally worth. All you'd have to do is ask.

Regarding having your divorce "recognized" - the only time you need your divorce recognized is when you want to get married again to prove you are single ie: you need to produce your divorce certificate when you're applying for another marriage licence. That's it.

That matches with what I've been told as well.

[Rotalsnart]

Apologies to everyone I've contradicted in this thread (Mick, realgroovychick, spaint). Apparently I stand corrected. Oh, and spaint, pretty much everything I've read by you on the board has struck me as quite sensible. I wasn't questioning you personally, just relying on my instinct about how the law works here -- which is something that I really should know better than to do, considering that I'm often getting on other people's cases about doing the same thing (answering by instinct rather than actual knowledge).

Hope everything works out for the best for the OP and his spouse.