Taipei, Dec. 20 (CNA) The Presidential Office said on Sunday that it will be more than happy to see Taiwan pass a provisional regulation on adopting international covenants into domestic laws to bring national standards in line with international norms in the future.

The office's spokesman Charles Chen (陳以信) made the remarks after Taiwan's Chinese Society of International Law urged the Legislative Yuan earlier in the day to pass the regulation as soon as possible.

Chen said that Taiwan has put effort in adopting important international covenants into domestic law ever since President Ma Ying-Jeou (馬英九) took office in 2008.

The Legislative Yuan has since approved the Act Governing Execution of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, giving the two international covenants legally binding force in Taiwan, said Chen.

Taiwan was one of the original signatories to the two treaties in 1967 when the Republic of China was still a U.N. member. It did not incorporate the treaties into local law before losing its U.N. seat in 1971.

In 2011, the legislature passed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, implementing the international accord adopted by the United Nations in 1979 to demonstrate Taiwan's efforts in protecting democracy and human rights, said Chen.

(By Dai Ya-cheng and Lee Mei-yu)
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