Taiwan twin brothers reunited after half a century

Aug 26, 2006, 9:54 GMT

Taipei - Two Taiwan twin brothers who were separated after they were born have been reunited by coincidence, a newspaper said on Saturday.

The Apple Daily story told how Wang Chi-hsin and Chen Hsieh-chin, both 47, were given up for adoption and separated shortly after they were born. Chi-hsin's adopted mother never told him he was adopted, but Hsieh-chin's mother had told him that he was adopted and that he had a twin brother.

On June 25, Chi-hsin and his family went sightseeing in San-hsia, a mountainous area near Taipei. While he was resting on a bench, a woman patted his shoulder and asked if he had a brother who looked exactly like him.

By coincidence, the woman was a cousin of Hsieh-chin and had recalled how he had spoken about having a twin brother somewhere.

Chi-hsin told here that he didn't have a brother, but the woman was insistent and exchanged phone numbers with him, and offered to arrange for him to meet Hsieh-chin.

On June 27, the two brothers met and Chi-hsin knew right away that Hsieh-chin was his twin brother. But to be sure, they had their DNA compared, with the results showing a 99.9 per cent likelihood of their relationship.

Chi-hsin went home to ask his mother if she had adopted him. She denied it and said she was Chi-hsin's real mother. But when Chi-hsin told her that he had met his twin brother and showed her the DNA test certificate, she admitted that she had adopted him.

Since they were reunited, the daily said, Chi-hsin and Hsieh-chin have been talking to each other on the phone every day and often dine together to make up for lost time. They have tried to find their biological parents but have not found them yet.