Taiwan has registered its first members of the Siraya, a win for a group that spent generations fighting to be recognized.

• A mother and daughter in Tainan became the first people formally registered as Siraya, weeks after the government named the group Taiwan's 17th Indigenous people.
• The Siraya are the first "Plains Indigenous" group ever recognized nationally, after a law passed in October 2025 opened the door.
• Plains groups were long shut out because officials treated them as having blended into Chinese culture, so only mountain tribes counted.
• More than 1,500 people have already applied, and proof usually means showing you or an ancestor were listed as Indigenous under Japanese rule.

Outlook: Eight more Plains Indigenous groups are waiting on their own recognition decisions, so the list of official tribes is likely to keep growing.