Japanese Government

Things that are happening at the Japanese Government level regarding human rights and NJ in Japan.

Taste the irony: Japan proposes language requirement for foreign long-term visas, yet protests when Britain proposes the same

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

HANDBOOKsemifinalcover.jpgwelcomesticker.jpgFranca-color.jpg

Hi Blog. Yes, you read that right. The GOJ wants to issue Japanese language tests for long-term NJ visa renewals, yet protests when Great Britain proposes the same. Moral: We Japanese can treat our gaijin any way we like. But don’t you foreign countries dare do the same thing to members of Team Japan. Bloody hypocrites. Debito in Sapporo

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Long-term residents may face language test
By KAHO SHIMIZU Staff writer
The Japan Times: Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2008
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20080116a1.html

The government may require long-term foreign residents to have a certain level of Japanese proficiency, Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura said Tuesday.

The Foreign and Justice ministries will begin discussing the envisioned Japanese-language requirement, Komura said without providing further details, including when the talks will start or who would be subject to the obligation.

“Being able to speak Japanese is important to improve the lives of foreign residents in Japan, while it is also essential for Japanese society,” Komura told reporters.

“I think (the potential requirement) would be beneficial because it would not only prompt long-stay foreign residents to improve their Japanese ability but also promote awareness among people overseas who are willing to come to (and work in) Japan to study Japanese.”

A Foreign Ministry official in charge of the issue stressed that the idea is not exclusionary. “It is not about placing new restrictions by imposing a language-ability requirement,” the official said on customary condition of anonymity.

Someone with high Japanese proficiency may be given favorable treatment in return, including easing of other existing visa requirements, he said. “(High Japanese proficiency) may actually make it easier to come and work in Japan,” he said. “We want to provide incentives for foreigners to learn Japanese.”

A Justice Ministry official said the discussions are neither intended to expand nor restrict the flow of foreign workers to Japan.

He also said the requirement should not be uniformly applied.

“We don’t want to prevent talented foreign workers from immigrating,” he said.

Some media speculated that the move is intended to expand the acceptance of unskilled foreign workers, given Japan’s shrinking population and expected long-term labor shortage.

But the Foreign Ministry official said the government’s stance — which is to issue work visas for foreigners applying for specific jobs that require particular qualifications while restricting foreigners seeking manual labor — remains unchanged.

According to the Foreign Ministry official, the two ministries hope to reach a conclusion on the matter within a year.

The idea of a language requirement emerged as part of the government debate on the conditions of a large number of foreign nationals of Japanese descent in such areas as Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture, which has a large population of Brazilians of Japanese descent.

Many such residents, who are often engaged in manual labor because they obtained ancestry visa permits that allow them to do so, are not covered by the social security system and their children are not enrolled in schools.

The Japan Times: Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2008
ENDS
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The MOFA offers more details on this in a February 12, 2008 Press Conference here:
https://www.debito.org/?p=1225

But put the shoe on the other foot and see how the MOFA reacts…

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Japanese community concerned about Britain’s plans for English tests
Japan Today.com/Kyodo News Friday, March 21, 2008 at 04:43 EST
http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/431717
Courtesy of Mark Mino-Thompson and Paul Hackshaw

LONDON — The Japanese community in Britain is hoping the government will rethink plans for a new English language requirement for foreign nationals coming to work in the country.

The Japanese Embassy in London has expressed “serious concern” at initial government plans to ensure that all skilled workers from outside the European Union seeking work visas have an “acceptable” level of English language proficiency.

It was felt that the level suggested was too high for the many Japanese who come to Britain on “intra-corporate transfers” (ICTs) for periods of around three years.

The Japanese Embassy in London, along with other foreign governments, has been lobbying hard to ensure that ICTs are exempted from the English language requirement or that the level of English required is reduced.

An embassy spokesman told Kyodo News that the initial level of English proficiency suggested by the government would have been a “hindrance” to Japanese firms dispatching staff on regular transfers. But the spokesman said he now feels the government was listening to the concerns of the Japanese and is awaiting a statement from the government in the next few weeks.

The Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Britain said it believes that, if implemented in its present form for ICTs, the plan would have a “profoundly negative impact” on Japanese firms here, and could lead to some relocating to other parts of the European Union.

However, there are indications the government may be about to water down its plan following pressure from foreign governments.

The government says no final decision has been taken on the English language requirement for ICTs but a statement will be made shortly. Informed sources have told Kyodo News that the Home Office is likely to lower the level of the English requirement for ICTs.

The English requirement is due to be introduced toward the year-end.

It is part of a general tightening up of Britain’s visa regime in an effort to make it fairer and more objective. The requirement is designed to ensure that foreign nationals can properly integrate into the country and are best equipped for working here.

Patrick Macartney, spokesman for the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said the majority of Japanese expatriates are working in Britain for a limited period of between three and five years and should therefore be treated differently from immigrants who are seeking to work and stay indefinitely.

He said, “If the English proficiency requirement were to be compulsory, even for people who stay for such limited periods in this country, this would create a huge problem for the personnel rotation policy of many Japanese companies.

“This is especially true in cases where companies need to send their technical or engineering experts, for whom the priority is their skills and/or knowledge and not language.

“The impact would be most severely felt by the manufacturing industry. Japanese companies who have factories in the United Kingdom might be forced to scale down or even relocate their operations because they could not secure the necessary number of technical people from Japan whose knowledge or experience was crucial to their operations.”

Danny Sriskandarajah, from the left-leaning think tank the Institute of Public Policy Research, said, “It (the English test) is going to be an issue. I don’t actually know the level required, but if it is to be meaningful it has to be reasonably high. It will pose a challenge for people.

“A significant proportion of the work permits are intra-corporate transfers. If you assume that some of those are coming from non-English speaking countries that do jobs which might not require English, they may be affected.”

Liam Byrne, the minister in charge of visa rules, acknowledged Japanese concerns at a recent parliamentary committee when he said, “If you talk to many Japanese investors, they will say that people coming over under intra-corporate transfers from a Japanese company, skilled engineers contributing quite considerably to the strength of the U.K. manufacturing base, are quite nervous about the kinds of English requirements that we would insist on.

“You cannot look at migration policy purely in terms of the economics. I think you do have to look in terms of the wider impact that migration has on Britain and that is why the prime minister has been right to stress the ability to speak English,” he said.

A spokeswoman for Britain’s Home Office said, “We will publish a statement of intent shortly setting out the detailed policy in this area. We are fully aware of the concerns expressed by Japanese businesses operating in the United Kingdom over the proposed English requirements, especially in relation to ICTs.”

In order to simplify immigration procedures, Britain has recently introduced a points-based system, similar to that in Australia. Basically, applicants are given more points the higher the level of skills they possess.

Entrepreneurs and scientists are classed as tier one and are very likely to get a visa. Skilled workers with an offer of a job in occupations such as nurses, teachers and engineers are classed as tier two and must also have met the English language requirement. This tier also includes those on intra-corporate transfers.

Under Home Office plans, tier two applicants should have reached level B2 in English according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.

This would require applicants to “understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics.” And they should be able to “interact with a degree of fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without strain for either party.”
ENDS

Outgoing BOJ chief Fukui Toshihiko proposes debate on immigration

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here’s something getting buried with all the debate over who’s going to be the next Bank of Japan Governor (for the LDP, when in doubt, put the same guy up again). Surprise to all those who think immigration is meaningless for Japan’s future–even the most influential economist in Japan disagrees.

Bonus: Proof positive (see Nonaka comment below) that even J immigration policy, such as it was, was based on racial paradigms of analyzing “foreigners” (bring in Nikkei to “ease social frictions”; boy were you wrong). Debito in Sapporo

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ANALYSIS: BOJ chief Fukui proposes debate on immigration
Associated Press, Mar 7 2008 09:59 PM US/Eastern
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8V8V76O0&show_article=1
Courtesy of Adam Wallace

TOKYO, March 8 (AP) – (Kyodo)—Outgoing Bank of Japan Governor Toshihiko Fukui believes Japan ought to hold an in-depth discussion on immigration in the face of its aging and declining population.

In a lecture late last month, Fukui, who is due to retire March 19, said the source of economic growth is an infusion of labor and the accumulation of capital but that manpower is decreasing in Japan because of the ongoing rise in the number of the elderly and fall in the number of newborns.

He said European countries and the United States face the same population problem but maintain higher economic growth than Japan, citing immigration as a primary reason for it.

“The time has come for Japan to thoroughly discuss whether it expects society to grow (by accepting immigrants) or hopes for a single-race society without much growth,” he said.

The number of Japanese aged 65 or older accounted for 21.0 percent of the population, the highest percentage in the world, according to a preliminary census in 2005. The rate of those aged 13 or younger was 13.6 percent, the lowest in the world.

The issue of the aging society with a falling birthrate has been discussed and various proposals made by business circles. Fukui’s comments appear to be a call for the issue to be taken up in the political arena.

But, in fact, the government of the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi addressed the matter after it was inaugurated in July 1998. Taichi Sakaiya, a Cabinet minister and director general of the Economic Planning Agency, stressed the need for acceptance of immigrants.

The Economic Strategy Council, an advisory body to the prime minister, called for acceptance and expansion of immigrants in a report titled “Strategy for revitalization of the Japanese economy” that was submitted to Obuchi in 1999. The expert panel, working on devising a “concept of Japan in the 21st century” under the direct control of the prime minister, clearly stated the need for an immigration policy in its final report compiled in 2000. It reportedly reflected the intent of the prime minister’s office.

Hiromu Nonaka, then chief Cabinet secretary and a powerful political figure at the time, said in response to a question from Kyodo News that Japan should accept immigrants “in the future.” To begin with, he suggested that Japan start accepting descendants of Japanese immigrants abroad to help ease social frictions at home.

The Obuchi government, however, was up to its ears working out pump- priming measures for the economy and coping with a political power struggle. Obuchi died of a cerebral infarction at age 62 in May 2000 after suffering a stroke and falling into a coma.

Subsequently, Nonaka quit politics and the immigration issue never got off the ground for comprehensive discussion.

An awareness of belonging to a single race has been deeply rooted in Japan, generating a feeling of reluctance to accept immigrants. Furthermore, income disparities among people between big cities and local areas have become a big issue in the past few years, depriving society of any leeway to receive immigrants and creating circumstances that make it difficult for the immigration issue to become a topic for politicians to discuss.

The question of whether it is right or wrong to accept immigrants will inevitably become a political issue since Japan has entered the era of coping with an aging society with fewer children in the absence of any conspicuously effective measures to wrestle with a dwindling birthrate.

Hidenori Sakanaka, director of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute and a former Justice Ministry bureaucrat, said acceptance of immigrants by Japan would be a “social revolution.” His institute has proposed that the nation receive 10 million immigrants over a 50-year period to bolster its aging and declining population.

As Fukui is preparing his exit as central bank chief, his comments on Japan’s immigration policy are leaving Japanese politicians battling over his successor with a lot of food for thought.

UN’s Mr Ban calls for all nations to face UN Human Rights Council scrutiny

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Here are some news updates on the UN and the Human Rights Council. Put the magnifying glass on Japan, too. Given its past excuses re racial discrimination (and the fact that it’s only submitted one human rights report since it effected the UNCERD twelve years ago–it should have submitted one every two years, or by now its sixth report), the GOJ has been unbecomingly and grossly negligent. We still have no law against racial discrimination. And nothing really even in the pipeline. That should be known about. By anyone who seriously thinks that Japan should get its wish to become a UN Security Council member. Just say no until the GOJ shapes up. Debito

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From: UNNews@un.org
Subject: BAN KI-MOON CALLS FOR EQUAL SCRUTINY OF ALL COUNTRIES BY UN HUMAN RIGHTS ORGAN
Date: March 5, 2008 12:00:52 AM JST

BAN KI-MOON CALLS FOR EQUAL SCRUTINY OF ALL COUNTRIES BY UN HUMAN RIGHTS ORGAN
New York, Mar 4 2008 10:00AM UN News

Opening the seventh session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva today, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called on its members to ensure that all nations are held equally accountable for the protection of rights as the new body begins its first-ever universal review of their performance.

“No country, however powerful, should escape scrutiny of its record, commitments and actions on human rights,” Mr. Ban said, hailing the start of the Universal Periodic Review, under which all UN Member States – at the rate of 48 a year – will be reviewed to assess whether they have fulfilled their human rights obligations.

“The Review must reaffirm that just as human rights are universal, so is our collective respect for them and our commitment to them. It must help prevent the distrust that surrounded the work of the Commission on Human Rights in its final years,” he added, recalling the accusations of bias and politicization that dogged the predecessor body whose work was taken over by the new Council in 2006.

Looking back at progress since the issuance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which will celebrate its sixtieth anniversary in December, Mr. Ban said that it had become clear that commitments and accountability are crucial factors in the effort to make those rights a reality for all.

That accountability, in turn, depends on the collective scrutiny of international organizations, governments and civil society, he said, calling it “a duty of the highest order for each individual State, and the raison d’être of the Human Rights Council.”

As for the record of the Council itself, Mr. Ban said that the establishment of its mechanisms and procedures had been on the right track over the nearly two years of its existence.

But he posed the question to Council members of whether they were fully meeting the high expectations of the international community, which included the application of human rights values “without favour, without selectivity, without being impacted by any political machinations around the world.”

“If you meet this benchmark,” he said, “you can count on my fullest support and defence in the face of criticisms and attacks, wherever they may come from.”

The Council’s seventh session, including a high-level portion for the views of government representatives, as well as expert panels and presentations by Special Rapporteurs, will run through 28 March.
2008-03-03 00:00:00.000
ENDS

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BAN KI-MOON PAYS TRIBUTE TO HUMAN RIGHTS CHIEF, FOLLOWING EXIT ANNOUNCEMENT
New York, Mar 7 2008 3:00PM UN News

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed “great regret” at the decision of United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights < " http://www.ohchr.org/EN/AboutUs/Pages/HighCommissioner.aspx">Louise Arbour to step down at the end of her first four-year term, which she confirmed today in Geneva.

“I have been most impressed by her extraordinary courage, energy and integrity in speaking out forcefully on human rights, which is among the UN’s most important mandates,” Mr. Ban said, following the announcement Ms. Arbour made at the Human Rights Council – the UN body inaugurated under her tenure, which ends in June.

Mr. Ban said that she never hesitated to incur the criticism of States or other parties by highlighting the victims of abuses or pointing out the inadequacies of national legal systems, and she consistently represented the highest ideals of the Organization.

“Her legacy will be one of a strengthened and more wide-ranging United Nations human rights system, a stronger focus on justice and accountability, reformed protection mechanisms, and a more balanced approach to the full range of civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights,” he said.

Ms. Arbour, a Canadian Supreme Court Justice and ex-prosecutor of UN war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, assumed the post of High Commissioner in 2004, after her predecessor, Sergio Vieira de Mello, was killed in a terrorist attack in Baghdad.

Along with announcing her departure, Ms. Arbour today presented her final annual report to the Council, highlighting the distressing human rights implications of renewed conflict in West Darfur and Sri Lanka.

In regard to the Council itself, she said the report stressed the need to support the participation of the least-developed countries in the first-ever Universal Periodic Review, which will assess the rights situation in all UN Member States.

She promised to share reflections on her tenure as High Commissioner at the Council’s next session in June.
2008-03-07 00:00:00.000
ENDS
________________

For more details go to UN News Centre at http://www.un.org/news

IHT: GOJ to “govern influential, widely read news-related websites”. Like 2-Channel

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here’s another development in the pipeline: the regulation of Internet speech, to stop “illegal and harmful content”. Libel, sure. But you know it’s just not going to stop there.

I have very mixed feelings about this issue. I am of course an advocate of freedom of speech. But I have also been the target of Internet libel myself, confirmed by a Japanese court victory more than two years ago, and never requited by the Defendant BBS 2-Channel. By exploiting the lack of Contempt of Court in this society (i.e. the means to change a Civil Case into a Criminal Case, including arrest and confiscation, if court verdicts are not followed), fools like the people who run 2-Channel will wind up empowering those who wish to justify these sorts of policy pushes to regulate freedom of expression.

And once it starts, it’s only a matter of time and degree. Wait and see. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Japan seeking to govern top news Web sites
By Michael Fitzpatrick
International Herald Tribune Wednesday, February 27, 2008
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/27/technology/wireless28.php
Courtesy Jeff Korpa

TOKYO: A Japanese government panel is proposing to govern “influential, widely read news-related sites as newspapers and broadcasting are now regulated.”

The government is also seeking to rein in some of the more unsavory aspects of the Internet, leaving in its wake, critics say, the censoring hand of government interference.

The panel, set up by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, said Internet service providers (ISPs) should be answerable for breaches of vaguer “minimum regulations” to guard against “illegal and harmful content.”

The conservative government, led by the Liberal Democratic Party, or LDP, is seeking to have the new laws passed by Parliament in 2010.

“Japan’s Internet is increasing its clout, so naturally the government wants to control it,” said Kazuo Hizumi, a former journalist who is the Tokyo city lawyer.

To better understand why a country better known for its information-technology prowess would take such steps, it is vital to understand the establishment’s relationship with the media since the Americans ceded wartime power in the 1950s, Hizumi said.

“Soon after the war we followed the U.S. model with the government issuing licenses through the FCC,” Hizumi said. “As one party, the LDP, came to dominate politics, it sought more control of the media so the FCC was abolished. There is no ombudsman here, so the government controls the media directly. With this new bill, the LDP will seek to do the same for the Internet.”

Certainly, such a construct has benefited the LDP, which has enjoyed nearly unbroken rule in Japan since 1955. Since then, government’s cozy relationship with big media has become legendary, as has the media’s self-censorship, which, Hizumi said, had repeatedly restricted the spectrum of voices heard – until the arrival of the Internet started to open the field up to dissent.

“The Internet threatens the government, but the new law will put the government back in control by making the ISPs directly answerable to the government,” Hizumi said. “This is the untenable position we are facing in Japan.”

Tokyo, for its part, maintains it is merely seeking to bring some accountability to Japan’s often wild – and sometimes libelous – Internet.

“The criticism that the report amounts to a call for censoring the Japanese Web” is completely unfounded, the Communications Ministry said in a statement. “Furthermore, the report takes the position that Japan should abstain from adopting regulations aimed at promoting government censorship or restriction of Internet content, such as blogs, and calls for examining the creation of a framework for promoting voluntary action by ISP and others as a means of dealing with illegal and harmful material.”

Such “voluntary action” has already been felt this month by the country’s mobile-services providers, who have been requested to filter certain content to all phones registered to people under 18. Previously such filtering had to be switched on; now it will take a guardian to switch it off.

A commendable effort by government and service providers, any right-thinking citizen might think, to protect the young. However, Japanese bloggers, wary of future controls on the larger Internet, have been busy pointing to the less obvious material that is also being filtered out on the mobile Internet.

The existing filtering services in use by the leading Japanese provider, DoCoMo, for example, reveals that categories like “religion” and “political activity/party” are filtered by the software.

“We have also perhaps a taste with what’s to come by looking at the filtering software used by certain local governments up and down the country,” Hizumi said.

What really strikes Hizumi and others is that there is so little public opposition or debate on a bill that would bring enormous change.

Chris Salzberg, who monitors, comments on and translates some of the Japanese blogosphere for Global Voices, an international blog round-up, said: “It seems that the Web community in Japan is really pretty unaware of all of this, or else just in disbelief. It’s a strange situation. Maybe nothing will come of it, but it still seems like something people should at least be paying attention to.”

“I’m afraid ordinary citizens don’t care about these lack of rights, consequently the Internet in Japan is heading for the Dark Ages,” Hizumi said.
ENDS

Interview (sound files) with Debito on KPIJ re activism, new book, the GOJ, and “The Japanese Way”

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

HANDBOOKsemifinalcover.jpg
Hi Blog. I had an interview a few days ago with Turner, webmaster of “Keeping Pace in Japan”, regarding the following topics. Go to his site for clickable sound files and audible answers.
http://www.keepingpaceinjapan.com/2008/03/newcomer-handbook-speaking-with-debito.html
Structure of the interview as follows:
===========================
KEEPING PACE IN JAPAN.COM
SUNDAY, MARCH 02, 2008

Newcomer Handbook: Speaking with Debito
From a phone interview, which took place on Thursday, February 21st over Skype.

I’m speaking tonight with Arudou Debito, formerly Dave Aldwinckle, naturalized Japanese citizen since 2000, human rights activist, and author of Japanese Only: The Otaru Hot Springs Case and Racial Discrimination in Japan and most recently the Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants, and Immigrants to Japan. Welcome, Arudou-san.

First of all, please tell us about your new book.

New book, answer

Would you recommend this book even to those who are just going to stay a year with the eikaiwa and then return home?

Eikaiwa, answer

Is there anything in the book we can’t find on the “what to do if…” section of your website?

What to do if, answer

How would you respond to people who say you don’t do things “the Japanese way”? More to the point, do you think there is such a thing?

Japanese way, answer

(Debito’s first experience in “thinking outside the box”)

Recently, there was a case involving a Pakistani girl being refused admission to a ballet school in Tokyo on what appeared to be racial discrimination. However, and correct me if I’m wrong, it turned out to be just a simple misunderstanding…

Ballet school, answer

Do you think you jumped the gun a little when you posted the story on your blog, without first contacting the school?

Jumping the gun, answer

Has there ever been a time in your activism work that you thought you acted overzealously? Were there any consequences to such actions?

Zealous, answer

There seems to a pattern among Japanese to be proud of being a monoethnic culture – do you think Japan is gradually starting to get a sense of pride from the growing diversity, or is there still this old school “closed-off island nation” mentality?

Monoethnic, answer

Ok, let me rephrase that – as far as the government is concerned, do you think there is an unspoken policy of trying to discourage immigration?

Government, answer

The basis of that question was really along the lines of your theory surrounding the police and the Gaijin Ura Hanzai File.

Police, answer

What’s your opinion about the new language requirement under consideration by the government – they haven’t really gone into specifics, but do you think a language requirement in general is a good idea for Japan?

Language requirement, answer

(Followup: Debito’s definition of a “gaijin”)

Do you think this policy is designed to – and I hate to put it this way – increase the “quality” of foreigners coming to Japan, the intelligence? In general, do you believe it’s intended to discourage or encourage immigration?

Quality of foreigners, answer

Anything else you’d like to get the word out about?

Debito’s book tour

All right, talking to Arudou Debito. Thank you very much.
————————

The book, “Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants, and Immigrants to Japan” is now available for order by fax through Debito’s website.
HANDBOOKsemifinalcover.jpg
Labels: crime in Japan, legal issues, politics in japan, racial discrimination in japan
ENDS
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http://www.keepingpaceinjapan.com/2008/03/newcomer-handbook-speaking-with-debito.html
Have a listen! Debito in Sapporo

Terrie’s Take on GOJ crackdown on dual nationality

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Although Terrie’s Take this week (yet another excellent essay) concentrates more on J citizens abroad taking NJ citizenships, there is also good mention and argument about J children in international marriages and the pressures upon them to conform to single nationality. As Terrie rightfully points out, this is ludicrous in a country which needs citizens; it shouldn’t be taking this degree of trouble just to put people off possibly maintaining a J passport just in the name of some odd nationality purity.

And dual nationality in itself would resolve many problems… I personally know several long-term NJ (and even some Zainichi) who would be happy to become Japanese citizens if it didn’t mean the sacrifice of one’s identity to having to choose. If you are a product of two cultures, why not have the legal status to back that up? Not half, but double. That’s what I would call the real Yokoso Japan. Debito in Sapporo

* * * * * * * * * T E R R I E ‘S T A K E * * * * * * *
A weekly roundup of news & information from Terrie Lloyd. (http://www.terrie.com)
General Edition Sunday, February 24, 2008 Issue No. 458

With all the recent goings on for foreigners over immigration entry requirements, it is easy to think that the Japanese Justice Ministry especially has it in for non-Japanese. But that isn’t true. They are just as tough on their own citizens who want to be dual nationals.

After publishing Terrie’s Take 456 about our opinions on why the immigration authorities are tightening up, we received some interesting email from Japanese readers wondering why immigration is picking on them as dual nationals, as well.

Most readers will know that Japan allows only one nationality. However, for the longest time, so long as a person was registered as a Japanese citizen first, whether or not you had gained a second nationality was politely ignored by the authorities. You just had to make sure that you didn’t make it too obvious that you held a separate nationality.

But now it appears that things are changing and the Justice Ministry seems to be conducting checks on Japanese citizens living overseas to make sure that they do not have dual nationality. For a sense of the situation, here is an extract from one reader’s letter:

“…I recently decided, after many years as a green card holder, to apply for US citizenship. This was partly triggered by the increasing tension of the US immigration process, which has understandably changed in attitude since 9/11. The tipping point for me was when a lawyer in Japan advised me that although dual citizenships are technically forbidden in Japan, it is a law that is not enforced.

Before I could complete my application process, however, I was told by another person that things in fact had changed. I confirmed this with the authorities. It seems that if you are Japanese and you renew your Japanese passport at your local US consulate, when you go to pick it up you are asked to show your green card or other residency documentation which allows you to be in the US. If you cannot produce this documentation, and you wouldn’t be able to if you held a US passport, they won’t hand over your new Japanese passport. Apparently this is how they are now catching dual citizens living abroad.

To avoid this, I could renew my passport in Tokyo, but if I do, I have to show them my juminhyo [Ed: personal register of your residency matters]. That means I have to re-establish residency and live back in Japan for a few months — which of course is difficult to do when one has a career to fulfill.

With all the dual Japanese nationals living abroad, it seems to be bad policy to make people have to sneak around the dual nationality issue. Japan needs to maintain and grow its population, not shrink it. And chances are that many of those people living abroad are either decent wage earners contributing tax back to Japan, retirees who take their health care costs with them, or simply good emissaries for Japanese culture…”

Our thanks to the reader submitting this succinct summation of the dual nationality problem. Two issues come to mind: 1) not only people resident overseas, there is an increasing problem with dual nationals back here in Japan, as the children of 37,000 (approx.) international marriages a year start to come of age, and 2) might it be that Japan’s cooperation on fingerprinting databases with the USA and elsewhere will lead to an increased enforcement of the policy as well?

1. As a study by Sean Curtin, a former professor at the International University of Japan in Niigata found, the average number of children had by couples of an international marriage in Japan is 2.9, more than 3 times the average number of kids had by a Japanese-only couple living in Tokyo (national average is higher at 1.23). Further, of the 700,000 or so marriages a year, the 37,000 international ones comprise about 5%-6% of the total. By inference, then, it is likely that somewhere between 50,000 to 180,000 kids of mixed-nationality parents are born in Japan each year.

And each one of these dual national kids, most raised at home in one culture and at school in another, after turning 20 (plus an additional 2 year’s grace) has to choose which parent’s nationality they want to take. We think it’s a morally bankrupt question to force on those kids. It thrusts upon them the cold reality of the Japanese judicial concept of one allegiance, one home — also, we believe, the same reason why there is no judicial acceptance of joint custody of children in Japan.

It’s not hard to imagine that if the child has a parent from a poor country, indeed, most foreign mothers here are from developing Asian countries, then they will choose to be Japanese, despite any personal feelings of discrimination and disadvantage that they have probably been subjected to throughout their lives. If the child’s parent is from a first world country, then the choice is more likely to be for the other country.

And so Japan loses one potential contributor to its future, and gains a less than happy second one.

We interviewed some mixed-nationality kids who are nearing adulthood, asking them about what they thought of being forced to choose. The common response was that they wanted to keep both nationalities, but if forced, those that experienced the most discrimination didn’t want to remain Japanese.

2. According to 2005 government statistics, one third of all the approximately 1m (now probably around 1.1m) Japanese living overseas are resident in the USA. They are joined by an additional 115,000 Japanese who are considered permanent expatriates. Interestingly, the stats come from the Ministry of Justice, and carry the comment that it knows that a large number of Japanese living overseas are in fact dual nationals. One wonders when they are going to start acting over this information.

Perhaps the answer lies with the new immigration fingerprinting system being used on foreign residents and visitors. In implementing this screening system, the Japanese government has started sharing a US fingerprint tracking database, and within the year it will share with other countries as well. Although we’re assured that the data is private, we are equally sure that the Ministry of Justice will be “fascinated” by the opportunity to analyze migration data of Japanese nationals drawn from other countries’ ingress-egress points — something that they’re unable to do in Japan. In fact, this could be happening right now.

The scenario is obvious: a Japanese national uses their passport to exit Japan, then the same person should be trackable as they enter the USA. If they don’t show up, but they were on a given US-bound flight, then clearly they either have a green card or they are a dual national.

But apart from consular checks overseas, it is not clear that the government has chosen to act on a wide scale yet. Indeed, it knows many Japanese are dual nationals and until now has allowed people to maneuver around this inconvenient fact.

So how do people manage to keep both passports?

Firstly, they make sure that they are registered as Japanese first, since other countries allowing dual nationality do not require the new citizen to announce their new status to their original country. Secondly, in becoming a citizen of the second country, the Japanese national ensures that they maintain their juminhyo in Japan. This means that they pay taxes, vote, etc., just as if they are expecting to return to Japan. It is a cumbersome arrangement, but basically this is the price they pay for the flexibility offered by being dual national.

Thirdly, they use their passports in a way that doesn’t challenge the status quo. The rule for usage is important: Japanese passports for entry and departure from Japan, and the other nationality passports for entry and departure from the other country. Never show the other country’s passport when entering Japan. If you do, and if the consequences are followed through, the Japanese government can (and threatens to on its web site) strip the Japanese citizen of their nationality.

We end by saying that this is a crazy situation. On the one hand, we have a possible crack down on hundreds of thousands of people and a deliberate policy of alienating (pun intended) all these potential citizens. On the other hand, we have a government panel that advised back in December the government should spend up to JPY2.44trn (US$22bn) on measures to help counter the declining birth rate!

Since the number of people likely to lose their citizenship amounts to 5%-10% of the birth rate, we suggest that part of that JPY2.44trn outlay be spent on making a phone call to the Justice Ministry to prepare legislation allowing Japanese to do what many have practiced for generations — become law-abiding citizens of the countries of both of their parents.

The remainder of the money could be spent on nursing homes for those loyal citizens who decided to grow old at home…

ENDS

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ABC News (USA) finally breaks the story about Japan as haven for child abductions

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here’s a magnificent article from ABC News (USA) about how Japan remains a haven for child abduction after a Japanese-NJ marriage breaks up.

Long-overdue attention is given one of Japan’s worst-kept secrets–how NJ (who have no Family Registry) have essentially no parental or custody rights in Japan after a marriage breaks up. And how Japan refuses to take any measure to safeguard the access of both parents to or the welfare of the child under the Hague Convention (which it refuses to sign).

I met Paul Wong during my speech last December at the upcoming film documentary on this subject, FOR TAKA AND MANA. Glad he’s gotten the attention his horrible case deserves. I too have no access to my children after my divorce, and I’m a citizen! Bravo ABC. Get the word out.

More on this issue on Debito.org here.
Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Spirited Away: Japan Won’t Let Abducted Kids Go
American Parents Have Little Hope of Being Reunited With Children Kidnapped to Japan
By RUSSELL GOLDMAN
ABC News (USA) Feb. 26, 2008
http://www.abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=4342760&page=1
Courtesy of Damian Sanchez

Kaya Wong’s parents never imagined they would be able to have a baby.

Born two years after her mother was diagnosed with cancer, Kaya, now 5 years old, was a miracle.

But for Paul Wong, Kaya’s father, the unimaginable soon became the unthinkable. Months after the cancer fatally spread to his wife’s brain in 2005, Kaya, he says, was kidnapped by her maternal Japanese grandparents.

Despite being his daughter’s sole surviving parent, he has few options available to him as an American in Japan, a historically xenophobic country that does not honor international child custody and kidnapping treaties. It’s also a nation that has virtually no established family law and no tradition of dual custody.

He knows where his daughter lives, where she goes to school and how she spends her days, but despite the odd photograph from a family friend, he has not seen his daughter once in the last six months.

Wong is one of hundreds of so-called “left-behind” parents from around the world whose children have been abducted in Japan, the world’s only developed nation that has not signed the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction.

‘Heartbroken’

There are currently 39 open cases involving 47 American children spirited away to Japan, a key American ally and trading partner, but many more go unreported. Not a single American child kidnapped to Japan has ever been returned to the United States through legal or diplomatic means, according to the State Department.

“This entire experience has left me heartbroken,” Wong told ABCNEWS.com. “We always wanted children. My wife and I talked about starting a family for a long time, but because Akemi was sick we kept having to wait. When Kaya was born, I promised my wife that we would move to Japan so that our daughter would know about her Japanese heritage and Akemi, despite her own illness, could care for her elderly parents.”

Wong, a 41-year-old lawyer, says he does not regret keeping his promise to his ailing wife, but his pledge set into motion a series of events that have kept him from seeing his only child.

“She’s very energetic, outgoing, active, inquisitive innocent little girl. She is simply perfect, and sweet as can be. She is not afraid of anything,” he said of his daughter during a phone interview from Japan. “I’m breaking up just thinking about her and talking about her. She loves to laugh and has a smile just like her mother’s.”

Kaya was born in San Francisco in 2003 and is a dual citizen of the United States and Japan. The young family lived in Hong Kong, with Akemi making occasional trips to California for treatment until she and Kaya moved in with her parents in Kyoto, Japan.

Abuse Allegations Common

For more than a year after her mother’s death in December 2005, Kaya continued to live with her grandparents, with Wong visiting monthly from Hong Kong as he worked to find a job that would allow him to move to Japan.

Once he found a job and was preparing to move, however, things suddenly changed.

“Once I moved to Tokyo last year, the grandparents did everything possible to keep Kaya away from me. When I said I’m taking her back, they filed a lawsuit against me filled with lies and claimed I had sexually assaulted my daughter. There are no facts and the evidence is completely flimsy.”

According to Wong, with the exception of one long weekend in September 2007 when he took his daughter to Tokyo Disney, her grandparents were present every time he was with Kaya.

He said that a Japanese court investigator found that the girl was washed and inspected every day after a swimming lesson at her nursery school and her teachers never noticed signs of abuse.

ABCNEWS.com was unable to contact the grandparents Satoru and Sumiko Yokoyama, both in their 70s. State Department officials would not comment on the specifics of this case, but a spokesperson said that allegations of abuse were not uncommon in some abduction cases.

Kaya’s grandparents are elderly pensioners. Under a Japanese program to stimulate the birth rate, families with young children receive a monthly stipend from the government, one reason Wong believes the grandparents have chosen to keep Kaya.

Though Wong’s case is unique in that most child custody disputes result from divorce not death, his is typical of the legal morass in which many left-behind parents find themselves. He has spent thousands of dollars on legal fees and makes regular appearances for court hearings, but his case, like many others, remains stalled.

American parents quickly learn that the Japanese court system is rather different from that of the United States.

There is no discovery phase, pretrial disclosure of evidence, or cross-examination. Lawyers for each side simply present their cases before a judge.

Furthermore, there is no concept of parental abduction or joint custody. The parent or family member who has physical custody of the children, generally the Japanese mother or her family, is granted legal custody.

“Fundamentally, people believe that Japan must have a legal system available to deal with child custody and similar problems,” said Jeremy Morely, an international family lawyer. “In reality, however, there is no such system.”

“Family law is very weak in Japan. There is also a cultural perception that a Japanese child is best off in Japan with a Japanese parent. Boiled down, the law is: Whoever has possession has possession and the other parent should mind his own business,” Morely said.

Culture Clash

Culturally, there is no concept of dual custody or visitation. Once a couple gets divorced, the children are typically assigned to one parent and never again have contact with the other parent.

After divorcing his then-pregnant wife of four years in 1982, former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi retained custody of his two eldest sons, Kotaro and Shinjiro. His ex-wife Kayoko Miyamoto took custody of their unborn son, Yoshinaga Miyamoto. Since the divorce Miyamoto has not seen her two eldest sons, and Koizumi has never met his youngest son, Yoshinaga.

Against this cultural backdrop, American parents seeking custody find themselves in an endlessly revolving door of hearings that go on for years and yield no results.

Paul Toland, a commander in the U.S. Navy, estimates he has spent “well over $100,000 in attorney’s fees” for the last five years in an effort to get back his daughter.

Toland’s daughter was taken by his ex-wife to live with her parents in Tokyo while he was stationed in the country in 2003 and he has not seen the girl since.

He began fighting for custody of his daughter Erika, 5, when she was just 9 months old. When his wife, Etsuko Futagi, committed suicide in September 2007, Erika’s maternal grandmother got custody.

“I feel real frustrated because I’m in a holding pattern,” said Toland, 40, who lives in Virginia. “It has been a nightmare trying to get through this.”

Possession Is Key

Though Toland is his daughter’s sole surviving parent, judges in countless hearings have upheld the cultural imperative that it is in the child’s best interest to stay with whomever she is with at that moment.

“Whoever has custody when they walk into court has custody,” Toland said. “Judges never want to disrupt the status quo. There is no enforcement of the law because there is no teeth in the system. Police won’t intervene because they say it is a family matter. Every judge knows that and rules in favor of the status quo because he would lose face if he ordered something that would never be followed through on.”

For now, Toland can only wait and keep trying through the courts.

He said he regularly sends “care packages  big boxes full of presents and videotapes of me reading her children’s books.” Since he does not know whether those videos ever make it to his daughter, he keeps copies locked in a strong box to give her if and when he finally gets custody.

He has considered kidnapping Erika, but says the girl is under her grandmother’s constant supervision.

“Parental abduction is not a crime in Japan, but taking a child out of Japan is a crime. It is legal to abduct my own kid in Japan, but it’s a crime to take her back home with me.”

His parents have each just turned 80 and have never met their granddaughter.

“It is a crime to keep my parents from knowing and loving Erika,” he said.

‘Countries Disagree’

With the legal and cultural cards stacked against them, many Americans turn to the State Department and politicians for diplomatic help, but to little avail.

“On most things Japan is an important partner,” said Michele Bond, the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary for Overseas Citizens Services. “This, however, is one issue where we greatly differ. Left-behind parents often engage in a fruitless campaign to get back their children.”

The State Department, she said, regularly raises the issue of international abduction and Japan’s refusal to join the Hague Convention, a 1980 international treaty on cross-border abductions.

Other countries, particularly Muslim nations that practice Shariah, also have not joined the treaty, but in many of those cases the United States has worked out agreements, or memoranda of understanding, to allow for the return of children. There is no such memorandum with Japan.

“We engage with the government of Japan at every opportunity and bring it up all the time. We try to raise the visibility of the issue and make them aware that this is not the tradition in other countries. Progress has been slow but we are hopeful to find a solution that respects both cultures and everyone’s rights, especially the children,” Bond said.

The State Department currently has 1,197 open cases of child abduction involving 1,743 children worldwide.

Bond said many cases of abduction to Japan go unreported because families know there is little the U.S. government can do to help.

Legislative Efforts

“Culturally, the Japanese are not disposed to deal with foreign fathers. The law does not recognize parental child abduction. Criminal extradition is limited because they don’t recognize that a crime has taken place,” she said.

Despite efforts on behalf of U.S. legislators to contact Japanese diplomatic officials, Wong has received no word of a change in his case.

In April 2007, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., sent a letter to President Bush about child abduction on the occasion of the Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s visit to the United States.

“I am very concerned over Japan’s lack of assistance in these cases and urge you to insist that Japan cooperate fully with the United States and other countries on international parental child abductions. Furthermore, I hope you will press Prime Minister Abe to support the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction and to implement a formal two-parent signature requirement for obtaining passports for minors,” the letter stated.

The Japanese government would not comment on specific cases of child abduction and in an exclusive statement to ABCNEWS.com never used the word “abduction.”

“We sympathize with the plight of parents and children who are faced with issues of this kind, which are increasing in number as international exchange between people expands,” reads a statement from the Japanese Embassy in Washington, D.C.

The embassy said that the Hague Convention was inconsistent with Japanese law, but that joining the convention was still under review.

“Regarding the possibility of Japan’s joining the Hague Convention, we must point out that [the] Japanese legal system related to child custody is quite different from the underlying concept of the Hague Convention. Japanese courts always take into consideration what the best interest of a child is with respect to each individual case, while the Convention provides the relevant judicial or administration authorities in principle [to] order the return of the child, unless the limited exceptions apply.”

Few Successes

Left-behind parents are used to hearing similar language from Japanese judges and American diplomats relaying messages from their Japanese counterparts.

“We strongly believe that it is in the best interest of a child to have access to both parents,” said the State Department’s Bond.

She said a child has never been returned to the United States as a result of diplomatic negotiation or legal wrangling, and knew of only three cases where children were reunited with their American parents  “two in which the parents reconciled and one in which a 15-year-old ran away.”

Michael C. Gulbraa of Salt Lake City is the father of that 15-year-old, his now 17-year-old son Christopher. Christopher returned to the United States in 2006, and calling him a runaway undermines years of careful planning by his father to ensure that if his son wanted to get out of Japan he would be able to.

After Gulbraa and his wife divorced in April 1996, she gained custody of Christopher and his older brother Michael K. Gulbraa.

In 1999, when the boys were 8 and 9 years old, Gulbraa learned that his wife’s second husband was under investigation for abusing his biological son.

After months of investigation by court-appointed guardians and experts, his ex-wife, Etsuko Tanizaki Allred, feared she would lose custody and took the boys to Japan in 2001.

In 2002, the court gave Gulbraa custody and charged Allred under Utah law with felony custodial interference and a federal international kidnapping statute. Despite the international warrants for Allred, Japanese courts did not require her to return their children to Gulbraa.

“That’s how things remained until July 2006. I did everything I could think of. I even petitioned the Vatican to intervene,” he said.

In 2006, Christopher contacted him via text message and said he wanted to come back to the United States. Since his sons were kidnapped, Gulbraa had been working on a plan to get the boys emergency passports and onto a plane with whatever help U.S. diplomatic officials could legally provide.

One Who Escaped

When the boy’s mother learned of the plan, she took his cash and identification, making the train trip to the consulate and obtaining a passport all the more difficult.

Gulbraa will not disclose quite how his son got the money for the train, but said he had traveled to the Osaka consulate and provided it with photos of the boy and questions only he could answer in order to confirm his identity.

“Chris said he was going for a bike ride and got on a train from Nagoya to Osaka. We had to work through his not having any money or picture I.D. In late August 2006, he got home with the help of every agency of the U.S. government involved. From the consulate in Osaka to the embassy in Tokyo, everyone did everything to get him home without breaking the law.”

For Gulbraa being reunited with his son is bittersweet knowing his older son, Michael, remains in Japan.

Today, Gulbraa supports other left-behind parents and continues to petition the U.S. government to ensure kidnapped American children are reunited with their rightful guardians.

“It is mind boggling that we kowtow to an ally because we are worried about trade and beef exports, when people’s children are being torn from them. Abduction is abduction and it needs to stop.”
ENDS

Yomiuri: Govt to help NJ primary- and secondary-ed students learn Japanese

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Speaking of language requirements for visa renewals, this may be good news, albeit it only applies to youth (very good news in itself). Sorry I left this article sitting in my inbox for so long. Friend who sent me this has this comment immediately below. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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There is one line that bothers me though: “Because these students do not speak Japanese, some have had trouble fitting in with classmates, which has led to behavior problems or even crimes.” They just had to throw that in. Reminds me of the anti-Mexican comments my grandfather is always sending me.
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Govt to help foreign students learn Japanese
The Yomiuri Shimbun Nov. 6, 2007
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20071106TDY03104.htm

The Education, Science and Technology Ministry will launch a program to help the increasing number of foreign students at public primary, middle and high schools to acquire Japanese language skills.

Currently, local governments handle Japanese language education for foreign students at public schools.

The ministry plans to provide financial and other support to the local governments to employ part-time instructors, who are proficient both in Japanese and a foreign language, with the goal of enhancing students’ understanding in classes and Japanese lessons.

According to the ministry, foreign nationals at public primary, middle and high schools throughout the country numbered 70,936 as of May 2006.

Of those students, 22,413 at a total of 5,475 schools did not understand Japanese sufficiently to absorb their lessons.

The number of these students increased by 8.3 percent from the previous year, and had been increasing annually.

Since the Immigration Control Law was revised to permit the employment of ethnic-Japanese foreign nationals for unskilled jobs in 1990, a growing number of people have come to Japan from South America.

Portuguese, spoken in Brazil, is the most common language among foreign students at 38 percent, followed by Chinese at 20 percent and Spanish at 15 percent.

Because these students do not speak Japanese, some have had trouble fitting in with classmates, which has led to behavior problems or even crimes.

The ministry is taking the increase in problems associated with Japanese language ability seriously and decided the central government needs to support local governments in this concern.

It has included 1.96 billion yen in its budget request for the next fiscal year for hiring about 1,600 bilingual instructors around the country by the end of that year.

(Nov. 6, 2007)
ENDS

Terrie’s Take 456 on Immigration’s looming crackdown on NJ residents

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. Here’s an excellent article from Terrie Lloyd, as usual. Debito in transit.

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Terrie’s Take General Edition Sunday, February 10, 2008
Issue No. 456 A weekly roundup of news & information from Terrie Lloyd. (http://www.terrie.com)

We have been through Narita immigration 3 times now since the November 20th, 2007, implementation of taking fingerprints and facial images. Prior to the changes, many foreign residents were concerned about being forced to separate with their Japanese spouses and kids and having to join the tourist lines, thus enduring a blow-out on waiting times at immigration while the family waited at the other side. In the past, permanent residents could slip through in the Japanese-only lines, in just 10-20 minutes.

After the implementation date started to loom and enough people became concerned, a number of foreign chambers of commerce got involved and made submissions to the Justice Ministry to ensure that the changes wouldn’t be detrimental to international commerce (a great platform to argue from). At the eleventh hour, the Ministry decided that there should be a separate purpose-made Permanent Resident line, so as to allow foreign permanent residents traveling frequently to China and elsewhere an easy passage in and out of Japan. It is no secret that despite the costs, some foreign multinationals prefer to have their senior management for the region reside in Japan. This proved an important point of leverage in getting the initial arrangements changed.

As a result, the reality is that now Permanent Residents (PR) wait even less time than Japanese nationals to get through immigration, and sometimes there are only 2-3 people queued at the PR line for an entire airplane arrival. It’s embarrassing to see the number angry or puzzled looks from Japanese herded into half the number of lines they once had, while the PRs waltz through.

Even the foreign tourist lines are a lot shorter than they once were, so we don’t think the Immigration folks will maintain such one-sided preference for foreign visitors for long — but it’s nice while it lasts. Perhaps more importantly, the presence of this special line (actually there are now two) proves that the Justice Ministry does in fact listen to the foreign business organizations.

And that’s probably just as well, because there appears to be a clear intention by the government to start tightening up controls on foreigners living in Japan. Foreign chambers of commerce need to start looking at these measures before they become committed to law later this year.

Over the last 2 years, there have been a number of legislatory submissions and trial PR balloons floated that indicate that the government is intending to significantly increase its control over foreigners living here. Given that many other countries also impose strict tracking and controls on foreign residents who are not migrants, this wouldn’t necessarily be such a bad thing providing that there was some upside offered such as by those other countries. In particular, Japan needs to make laws and apply the proper enforcement of UN human rights to foreign residents. Rights such as anti-discrimination, right to impartial justice, fair treatment of refugees, proper criminalization of human trafficking, and rights of children are all severely lacking. But these unfortunately don’t seem to be part of the agenda at this time.

The latest round of controls was initiated by the Justice Ministry at the end of January, and was subsequently reported on by the Japan Times, http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20080126a1.html. The Ministry has submitted legislation to the Diet for approval this year that will scrap the Alien Registration system and replace it with a pseudo Family Register modeled on the Japanese one. The idea is that the current system tracks people as individuals, and so as their circumstances change and they get married and have kids, it is not obvious to the local authorities that these changes have occurred.

Commentary in the Japanese press seems to indicate that a driver for this change was the many Brazilian kids of Japanese-Brazilian families living in Gunma who don’t attend local schools and/or whose parents would move frequently and thus the kids were not at the schools the local authorities expected them to be at — thus causing the local government guys to embark on frequent goose chases to find out where they moved to. A Family Register would clearly alleviate this problem.

One thing to note about this proposed legislation is that the collection and distribution of data on all foreign residents in the future will become the job of the Justice Ministry, not that of the various local governments all over Japan. Centralization of the data would be achieved by collecting information from returning foreign residents at airports and/or at immigration offices, and would be keyed into central servers, as well as being encoded in to IC cards issued in replacement of the current Alien Registration card.

In and of itself, the idea of creating family registers for mid- and long-term residents in Japan is not such a bad idea. Yes, it would require that foreigners be more conscientious about registering changes of address and personal circumstance, but this would be no more onerous than for any of our Japanese colleagues. However, when you start looking at the change in context with some other recent Justice Ministry (and other Ministries) announcements, one wonders if there isn’t a larger agenda at work?

For example, take the January 2007 announcement, reported in the Nikkei, that the children of long-term foreign residents will be required in the future to attend local Japanese schools rather than English-speaking International ones, as the the current grey zone situation allows. Or the October implementation of compulsory employer reporting of foreign workers — which effectively makes employers the decision-makers on whether someone is working legally or not.

And the real kicker in December where a minister suggested that long-term residents will be given a Japanese language test before their visas are renewed. This point has got a lot of long-term Western foreign residents worried, because until now it has been perfectly feasible for someone to work for decades within the foreign community and never really become fluent in the language. Then of course, there are all the 3- to 5-year foreign CEOs appointed to manage their companies’ operations in Japan. What becomes of them and their families? We will find out when the Justice Ministry makes its final recommendations in the next month or so.

The message coming from the Justice Ministry is that they want to gain direct control over foreign residents in Japan and that they want people to be properly assimilated into society, by ensuring adequate language capabilities and their children attending regular local schools. At the same time, the number of foreign residents has been increasing at a steady rate, and so the controls don’t seem to be part of a general xenophobic trend (at least, no worse than it is at present) in government policy. Even after the highly publicized 2003 murder of a family by Chinese students, although the following year the number of students dropped by 20%, now in 2008 the total number is rising again, and will soon exceed 100,000.

Indeed, stepping back from the immediate, “What is Hatoyama and his Justice pals up to?” many of these announcements and new rules sound more like they are part of a larger plan to prepare for a large future influx of foreign residents. We speculated on this fact back at the beginning of 2007, but now it is much more obvious that this is the case. We all know that it is inevitable that the number of foreigners will increase, since not only will the nation’s factories need another 4m people in the next 10 years, but rest homes for the aged will need another 500,000 able-bodied, low-cost employees as early as 2014.

Most likely the reason the government hasn’t said publicly that they are in fact preparing the ground for a lot more foreign workers is that as polls have shown, many Japanese voters are still xenophobic, with up to 60% saying that they blame foreigners for a rise in crime, for example. So, instead, these new foreigner control law reforms are being carried out under the guise of “anti-terrorism” or “anti-crime,” which plays well to conservative voters.

So if there is a master plan, what other changes should we be expecting as foreigners living in Japan? Our guess is that the biggest change will simply be the absolute loss of privacy. Every foreign resident will be carefully checked on whether they are contributing to the social insurance program and paying their taxes. Those not complying will probably lose their residency rights — and we imagine that there will be few avenues of appeal where an administration mistake has been made. You only need to look at the process and meager results for refugee status appeals to see what the outcome is likely to be.

There will also be substantial increase in governmental department sharing of foreign resident data. A police check of all foreign fingerprints will become standard practice for all unsolved crimes. Even minor infractions of the law (fines, etc.) will become factors in evaluating continued residence, or for refusal of entry at Immigration. Less obvious will be the likely mis-use of the database for private purposes. Already private detective agencies use senior ex-police to gain inside information on individuals they are checking out (we know because we were offered to subscribe to just such a service several years ago). With the new centralized database, this will become a lot easier to do.

Then there is the issue of education of one’s children. This is a thorny issue, and probably one that will be met with significant response from the foreign community. Our guess is that this aspect of the integration program (pogrom?) will take much longer, and will require the Ministry of Education to agree to create a special category of state support for schools that don’t meet its curriculum, providing they do at least offer sufficient Japanese language exposure.

There will probably be several new visa categories. One that industry obviously wants is something that lets them bring low-cost workers in and prevents those people from using the constitutional right of freedom to work to skip off to a better paying job. Until now, the Trainee category filled that role, but industry needs something that will keep people here longer than 2-3 years. An appropriate nickname for the document will be the “slavery visa”.

Lastly, there is the even thornier question of what to do about expats. Our guess is that any new legislation passed will create a set of exemptions for those who are legitimate expat appointees in Japan. This mechanism already exists in other countries. In Australia, for example, those working on a 457 visa (Temporary Long Stay Business work visa) and earning over AUD75,000 a year can be exempt from the English language requirements normally needed.

This would conveniently provide Japan with an all-important loophole to deal with tough cases, and at the same time allow those foreign residents wanting to continue sending their kids to international schools to do so. Our guess is that this will be tacitly accepted so long as those on higher salaries keep contributing to the social insurance program!
ENDS

MOFA Feb 12, 2008 Press Conference on language requirement for NJ Visas

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

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Hi Blog. FYI. The GOJ has plans for everyone. Linguistically… According to the MOFA in a press conference last week, conclusions on what kinds of Japanese language tests will be required for visas are due March 2008. But you look to be exempt if you bring enough money and political clout. And note the Japan Foundation’s pole position to profiteer. Anyway, check out the embryonic policy directions… Arudou Debito in Tokyo

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Ministry of Foreign Affairs Feb 12, 2008 Press Conference by Deputy Press Secretary Tomohiko Taniguchi (EXCERPT):
http://www.mofa.go.jp/u_news/2/20080212_201139.html

IV. Questions concerning the possible Japanese-language proficiency requirements for foreigners

Q: Good afternoon. I have questions regarding the immigration laws. In France, our government, as well as Japan, is at the moment thinking about granting visas to people who get language skills first. I heard there is the same kind of project in Japan. For France the aim is really to lower immigration entries. What are the motivations for Japan, and what kind of visas will it be? Is it for long-term residents or is it for short-term residents?

Mr. Taniguchi: Speaking of people from France, many people in Japan are being reminded of two outstanding individuals: Carlos Ghosn and Philippe Troussier. Those people are not going to be required to undergo any linguistic test or examination. They can come to Japan and start working instantaneously. The same applies to other professionals like bankers, dealers and traders who would find job opportunities in Tokyo’s central district, in the financial center.

The idea is to open the entry door a little bit wider to other categories. By “other” I mean other than professionals like bankers or coaches of professional football, and so on. That said, the idea is still hotly debated at the intra-government level, especially between the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. But we are not spending that much time. We are going to come to a tentative conclusion sometime by the end of March. But how soon we can implement that is going to be a matter of the pace and tempo with which we can solve minute details about what sort of arrangement can be provided to what sort of people. So I am not sure how soon we can implement this program, but that is basically the situation.

Q: When you say it would not concern bankers or automotive company CEOs, then what kind of jobs or what kind of population are you talking about?

Mr. Taniguchi: Well, even in terms of professionals or people with some kind of expertise – suppose, under the current framework, you have got to prove you have in the past 10 years’ worth of work experience as a consultant, let’s imagine. Then, the idea is not to de-incentivize those people from coming to Japan, but incentivize those people to come to Japan. Therefore, probably, the entry barrier is going to be lowered from 10 years to five years depending on the linguistic skill you have. So that applies to the professionals, people with expertise. For those in other categories, people engaged in rather more simplistic kinds of work, it will affect the easiness for them to enter Japan if the applicant can prove that he or she is capable in the Japanese language.

Q: Some people say this measure is also part of the wish of Japan to take care or protect itself against some terrorist actions or things like that. Is this kind of motivation behind it, like knowing better who is coming into your country?

Mr. Taniguchi: That is not necessarily the case. The Japanese Ministry of Justice already started to require bio ID when non-Japanese visitors enter Japan – you probably have gone through the same procedure, like fingerprinting or face photo. The idea of that initiative, of course, was to check the inflow of people so that any dubious potentially terrorist sort of people could not come into Japan. So that is more to do with preventing those people from entering Japan.

But the linguistic part, the language initiative, is rather to incentivize people not only to come to Japan, but also to feel more relaxed in their working conditions and environment. The two initiatives are totally different from one another.

Q: I just have a last question, and then my colleagues could ask you questions as well. Japanese is not an easy language, like I would say French is not an easy one as well. Don’t you fear that asking people to have linguistic skills in Japan is going to have people say, “OK, I will go someplace else,” and not try to come to Japan.

Mr. Taniguchi: That is the last kind of scenario that the Japanese Government wants. Therefore, we have to stress once again, and again and again, that the new initiative is not to dis-incentivize people from coming to Japan, but to incentivize, encourage people from abroad to come to Japan. So the idea is, if you speak Japanese it will be made easier for you to find job opportunities in Japan. So that is the basic outline.

Q: In terms of language skills, what kind of level are you thinking about?

Mr. Taniguchi: It is another matter of concern. It is one area that we have to spend a lot of time on, because at the moment the Japan Foundation is conducting the language examination only once a year or so. The frequency is much less than would be required. But we have to work together with the Japan Foundation, which is the body implementing the linguistic examination. So, ranging from that to many other minute details, we have to work out many things in order for it to be implemented.

Q: While we are on the topic, a related question. You mentioned intra-governmental discussions: how frequently are these held?

Mr. Taniguchi: Rather more frequently than you could imagine, because we are thinking of coming up with a tentative proposal by the end of March. Overall direction will be set sooner rather than later, within this fiscal year – that is, obviously, by the end of March.

Q: Is this a regular meeting?

Mr. Taniguchi: Well, it is an ad hoc meeting, so it is not the regular kind of meeting between the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Q: Do you know anything about the pace, and how many meetings have been held?

Mr. Taniguchi: Well, I do not know. I will have to check it out.

Q: Can you confirm that?

Mr. Taniguchi: Yes, I can.

(skip)

VI. Follow-up questions on the possible Japanese-language proficiency requirements for foreigners

Q: You mentioned the Japan Foundation’s role in this immigration measure. Very concretely, how would it work? Is that like your embassies or consulates would check the level of people before granting a visa?

Mr. Taniguchi: The honest answer is: I don’t know yet. The Japan Foundation is not a government body: it is an independent administrative agency, partially supported by taxpayers’ money. The Japan Foundation’s prime role is to enhance Japanese-language education as much as possible, just like Academie Francaise. The frequency of the Japanese-language test normally is once a year, which is far less than sufficient. In order for the Japanese Government to implement this program to require newly entering people to go through the language test it will of course take much, much more effort to be done by the Japan Foundation. So we have to work it out. No concrete picture has emerged yet.

Q: Because when you talk about the yearly test: this is conducted in any country where the Japan Foundation has some kind of representation? Is there one in Paris, for example?

Mr. Taniguchi: In Paris, I understand, it is a regular event.

Q: Okay, thank you.
ENDS
EXCERPT OF PRESS CONFERENCE ENDS

朝日：外国人研修生、ブローカー介在禁止に　法務省 MOJ: Brokers to be banned for NJ Trainees

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. No time to translate today. Some good news–the practice of using so-called “Brokers” for Foreign Trainee workers (who have no rights under labor law, as they’re only Trainees, and are thus quite easily exploited) are to be banned by the GOJ. So announces the MOJ in this article from the Asahi. Not an elixir, but a step in the right direction.

More on the problems with Brokers here. Debito

=======================

外国人研修生、ブローカー介在禁止に　法務省
朝日新聞　2007年12月25日09時50分
http://www.asahi.com/politics/update/1224/TKY200712240151.html

　外国人に日本の企業で知識や技術を身につけてもらう外国人研修・技能実習制度について、法務省は、受け入れ機関などに対して示している運用の指針を初めて改定する。制度は、安上がりな労働力の確保に利用されるなど、本来の狙いからかけ離れた運用が横行しているのが実情。このため、ブローカーを介在した受け入れを明確に禁止するなど改善を図る。

　研修・実習生は現在１６万人。商工会や中小企業団体などが受け入れ機関となり、紹介を受けた企業などが最長３年の研修・実習を行う。だが、法務省が０６年に「不正行為があった」と認定した機関は２２９機関と過去最多に。失踪（しっそう）する研修・実習生も増加し、同年は２２０１人に上った。

　同省が改定するのは、「研修生及び技能実習生の入国・在留管理に関する指針」（９９年策定）。これまでは抽象的に表現されていた「留意事項」や「不正行為」を具体的に列挙することにした。

　受け入れ機関に対しては、研修先の企業を「労働力不足の解消」といった広告で募集することを禁止。商工会などの機関が名目だけの受け入れ機関になってブローカーに「丸投げ」し、ブローカーが不当に利益を得るのを防ぐ目的から「公的性格を有する機関が名目のみの受け入れ機関になり、実質は他の機関が研修を行うこと」を禁止項目として明記した。

　また、海外の派遣機関が、研修・実習生から法外な保証金を取っているケースがあることを踏まえ、「徴収が判明した場合、その派遣機関からの受け入れを取りやめる」ことも盛り込んだ。

　研修・実習生を保護するため、受け入れ機関に「失踪防止」を理由に宿舎からの外出を禁止する▽希望の有無にかかわらず旅券や通帳を預かる▽所定時間以外の作業を強要する——ことなどを不正行為として明記。違反すれば３年間、新規の研修・実習生の受け入れを認めないこととした。

　同省は年内にも公表し、年明けから各機関に説明を始める予定だ。
ENDS

Japan Today/Kyodo on US pressure re Japan’s NJ fingerprinting

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Thus spake the hegemon:
========================

U.S. official hopes Japan will shift to 10-finger immigration screening
Wednesday, February 6, 2008 at 07:00 EST
http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/427187

TOKYO — A U.S. Homeland Security Department official voiced hope Tuesday that the Japanese government will start sometime in the future to take the fingerprints of all 10 fingers of each foreign visitor to step up accuracy of the screening system at immigration.

Robert Mocny, head of the US-Visit Program of the department, told Kyodo News the U.S. government is “willing to talk with the government of Japan to follow what we’ve done,” referring to the 10-finger system the United States has launched at some airports since November.
ENDS
========================

COMMENT: Once again, the US is sticking their fingers where they don’t belong… I don’t really understand why the US is so concerned about how other countries fingerprint (when Japan is already doing more biometric border control than most countries). The last gasps of a waning administration pulling whatever levers they can before November elections? Or just lobbying for more business for Accenture?

To me, this is just more proof that the NJ Fingerprinting policy in Japan is but a clone of the US’s. For once, I’m in agreement with the likes of Ishihara about a Japan that can say no. Arudou Debito
ENDS

産經：ギョーザだけじゃない？年金記録転記ミスは外国人のせい？

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

ギョーザだけじゃない？　派遣中国人が年金記録転記ミス
産經新聞　2008.1.30 22:23
http://sankei.jp.msn.com/affairs/crime/080130/crm0801302223050-n1.htm
このニュースのトピックス：年金問題

　年金記録紛失問題で、オンラインシステムに未入力の「旧台帳」と呼ばれる手書き台帳記録約１４６６万件について、手書きデータをコンピューター入力用紙に転記する際に、中国人などの派遣労働者が漢字を読み間違い、誤記するトラブルが発生していたことが２９日、民主党の厚生労働・総務部門会議で明らかになった。

　社会保険庁によると、昨年１２月１０日から２０日までの間、外国人派遣労働者約６０人に転記作業を行わせたところ、名字と名前の区切りを間違うなどのミスを連発。社保庁は全員を日本人に交代させた上で、すでにすべての転記ミスを修正しており、今後は派遣会社への派遣料支払額を減らすことも検討している。
ends

Alex Kerr on being a “Yokoso Ambassador” for the GOJ

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Based upon the Japan Times article immediately below, Alex Kerr, author of DOGS AND DEMONS and famous social commentator (who incidentally has written before for Debito.org about his statements on my activism, which had been willfully misinterpreted by the axe-grinders on Wikipedia), has been chosen as a GOJ tourism representative. The Community interest group had a number of questions about what this meant (reproduced below).

Alex was kind enough to answer them, and give his permission for his clarifications to be reproduced on Debito.org. Have a read. Thanks Alex. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

///////////////////////////////////////

17 tapped as Welcome to Japan envoys
Kyodo News/The Japan Times: Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2008
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20080123f4.html

The government has appointed fashion designer Junko Koshino and 16 other people as Welcome to Japan ambassadors for their contributions to draw foreign travelers to Japan.

On selecting the 17 Yokoso! Japan Ambassadors, a selection committee of the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Ministry took into account two aspects — building infrastructure in the hardware side to accept foreign travelers and transmitting Japan’s attractive features in the software side.

Koshino was selected because she has transmitted fashion that embodies Japanese-style images to the world, the ministry said.

Hotelier Kenichi Kai was picked because he served 10 years as the chairman of a committee in Beppu, Oita Prefecture, to attract foreign travelers to the hot-spring resort area and for his activities such as making hotels capable of exchanging yuan and five other foreign currencies.

American Alex Kerr was selected as he is working on renovating traditional houses in Kyoto and undertaking business to have foreigners experience lodging in Japan.

The ministry will introduce the 17 on its Web site as “role models” and consider holding symposiums, according to the officials.

The Japan Times: Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2008
///////////////////////////////////////

QUESTIONS RAISED ON THE COMMUNITY:

Friend Olaf Karthaus (who brought it up) wrote:
===============================
Alex Kerr, an American is among them.
What is his stance on fingerprinting?
Especially on fingerprinting PRs, a group he himself belongs to, I assume.

Anybody knows?
But I doubt that he would have been chosen as an ‘ambassador’ if he
wouldn’t be 100% backing the government’s line in that matter.
===============================

Friend Todd wrote:
===============================
Is that not the same Alex Kerr who authored Dogs And Demons (for
those unfamiliar, a legendary and scathing critique of Japan)?
===============================

Friend Matt wrote:
===============================
This reminds me of a quote I saw online recently that was attributed
to Chomsky:

“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly
limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate
within that spectrum – even encourage the more critical and dissident
views. That gives people the sense that there’s free thinking going
on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being
reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate.”
===============================

To which Todd responded:
===============================
Which is *exactly* why it would be so surprising for the authorities
to appoint Alex Kerr to such a position.
===============================

SO I ASKED ALEX:

Alex, this is a fundamentally sympathetic crowd (I can vouch for
them), so would you like to make any comment about what your job
entails? I will also blog it if you like, just in case there are
others out there who would like to know what’s going on. In this day
when the GOJ is seen is fundamentally NJ-unfriendly (what with
fingerprinting at the border and all), the question will probably
come up anyway sooner or later. Bests, Debito in Tokyo

AND HERE IS HIS REPLY:

///////////////////////////////////////

February 3, 2008
Dear Debito,

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you. The issue people bring up deserves a serious answer. Unfortunately, I’m so busy on the road right now that I don’t know if I can do it justice. Here are a few words:

Dear Debito

I understand why some people might wonder why I’ve accepted designation from the government as a “Yokoso Japan! Ambassador.” There can be indeed a process of co-option whereby foreign critics mute their voices when they get too close to the agencies they write about. As I’ve written in Dogs and Demons, I think many foreign academics suffer from exactly this problem.

I’ve therefore always tried to remain sensitive to this danger. That said, I don’t believe in absolute black-and-white on this issue. I am certainly opposed to numerous government policies, for example finger-printing, which I’ve personally had to undergo. But that doesn’t mean that one should never cooperate with any branch of the government on anything. That would be like saying that because one doesn’t approve of the Iraq war, one shouldn’t work with the US National Park Service.

The “Yokoso Japan! Ambassador” designation was presented by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport. I’ve repeatedly criticized this Ministry (in its present guise, as well as its former reincarnation as the Construction Ministry) for its damaging public works projects. Nevertheless, it happens that Japan’s tourist department (to be upgraded to the Tourism Agency by the end of this year) is located inside this Ministry. It’s this department that I’m working with.

I work with them because it’s my strongly held belief that an increase in international tourism can have great benefits for Japan. It makes regional economies less dependent on government construction projects. It brings home to people the financial merits of preserving their cities and countryside as tourist assets. And, not least important, the inflow of foreigners, can act as a powerful aid in “internationalizing” Japan in the true sense of the word. Many of the issues discussed in your blog will hopefully improve once people in Japan have an increased experience of actual foreigners traveling (and spending money) in their communities.

As for being “co-opted,” I’ve no intention of letting the rest of the Land, Infrastructure, and Transport Ministry (or Fishing and Agriculture Ministry, or so many others branches of the government, who go right on sponsoring wasteful and damaging construction projects) off the hook. Anyone who has heard my recent talks or read recent interviews would see that I continue to say (and illustrate with photos) exactly what I’ve been saying for years in Dogs and Demons and elsewhere.

In fact, this year I’m planning to do an illustrated photo-book which shows visually what the damage has been. It will feature ill-considered public works in the form of environmentally-harmful roads, dams, and so-called erosion control, destruction or mis-management of old houses, old towns, and cultural assets, visual pollution in the form of bad signage (including official propaganda signs from police departments and municipalities) and failure to bury electrical lines, tourist developments that are eyesores or adversely impact the environment, absurd public monuments, weird civil engineering projects (large and small scale) that transform rivers, mountains, and sea coasts, etc. I appeal to anyone on this website who’d like to give me a hand with this, since I don’t have time to go around the whole country collecting all the photos that I need.

Best wishes,
Alex
ENDS

KTO on a naturalizer back in 1985

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Here’s something interesting–a person who naturalized due to bureaucratic exigency. My reasons are quite different, of course. And the procedure for me was easier as well. But I agree with him that even after naturalization “I just feel myself.” But of course I feel Japanese as well, FWIW. As I said, my motivations for naturalizing are fundamentally different.

Anyone know what happened to this guy? It’s been twenty years. Courtesy Michael H. Fox. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

(Click on image to expand in your browser.)
ktooct86001.jpg
ENDS

Kandai PR Harassment: Why you don’t let non-Immigration people make Immigration decisions…

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. As regular readers know, as of October 1, 2007, all employers must report their NJ employees to the MHLW’s unemployment office, Hello Work, or face fines for potentially employing NJ in violation of their visas.

We’ve already uncovered on Debito.org some enforcement difficulties in deciding whether this meant NJ employed “full-time” or “part time” (this, as usual from a GOJ that likes grey areas of enforcement, has been left vague), with one case of somebody being demanded his Gaijin Card for receiving 500 yen compensation! Ludicrous.

Now here’s the next phase. An angry email from a friend of a friend, edited somewhat but with preserved emphases. About a person being hassled by his workplace (Kansai University) regarding issues they clearly know nothing about: over a Re-Entry Permit (being told he’s illegal visawise unless he gets one; wrong) despite being a Permanent Resident. Blogged with permission.

This is why you don’t let people who know nothing of Immigration law make Immigration decisions. Expect more of this sort of thing in future. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

//////////////////////////////////////////

PREAMBLE FROM FORWARDING FRIEND:

I got this mail from a colleague the other day. I am sending it (mostly uncut) to the PALE list to show how schools, which are not immigration officials, can mess up and abuse their power in potentially harmful ways.

Some background:
Apparently the govt. has asked employers to make sure all of their employees have valid papers to work in Japan. Some colleges, such as Kansai University, has therefore been asking non Japanese teaching personnel to prove their status. Others have ignored this, or gone about it another way. Signed, RR.

PS The letter did no good, and KanDai is still hasseling the instructor in question. His gaijin card, which they initially told him had expired (it did not, it is good until late 2008) stated that he was on a spouse visa, and since he was recently divorced, KanDai’s interpretation was that he was no long legally in the country. The problem is that the cards are good for 10 years, and that the card holder had subsequently moved to permanent resident status, a change that was not reflected in the actual card.

FORWARDED EMAIL FOLLOWS:

————————–
Maybe you can clarify this issue for me. Please read the letter below that I sent to Kandai.

While I have not renewed my Reentry Permit yet (which expired in October; from what I understand from many foreign teachers who have Permanent Resident status here, the only problem with having this expire and not renewed is that I cannot get back into Japan–if I leave), I planned to renew it after my classes ended. I have been too busy to go to the Marutamachi office during the semester.

I went to the ward office with a Japanese friend after Kandai told me that I was here illegally. The ward office staff there told me (after seeing my passport and Gaijin Card) that there was no problem with me being here illegally–that I am a PR and therefore legal–and that there is no PR visa that expires.

Kandai still insists that there is a problem. I will go to Marutamachi office later this week–when my friend has time to go. I do not want to go alone, because, if there is a problem, I would be arrested and probably thrown in jail. I want someone to know that I have been arrested, so that they can contact a lawyer or the union.

====================================

Dear Ueno-sama,

Enclosed are copies of the relevant stamps in my passport. Please pass them—and this letter—on to the appropriate person.

I am a PERMANENT RESIDENT in Japan. Please be clear on this point. I have talked with NUMEROUS people (ward office staff and foreign permanent residents teachers of long standing here) about the problem that your office has with my “Gaijin Card”–and they all say that your office is reading the card wrong and that your office apparently does not understand the laws and regulations concerning foreign resident status.

On Christmas Day (a religious holiday for me), I went down to my ward office—and they told me that there was NOTHING ILLEGALLY WRONG with my status here and that they see NO PROBLEM.

Now, I must go down to the Immigration Office (and waste one more day of my time to sort this problem out because after the new year began, your office, again, insisted that there was a problem.

I am sure that there is NOTHING ILLEGAL about my documents—the pertinent one has not expired. From what I understand, the PR visa does not even have to be renewed.

Nevertheless, because your office keeps INSISTING THAT I AM HERE ILLEGALLY, I MUST WASTE ANOTHER DAY IN ORDER TO STRAIGHTEN OUT THIS MATTER. I WILL ASK THE IMMIGRATION OFFICE TO CALL YOUR OFFICE—OR TO WRITE YOUR OFFICE A LETTER–TO INFORM YOU AS TO HOW PERMANENT RESIDENCY STATUS HERE WORKS.

Your office has asked to see my card a few times now and you have made numerous copies. You have asked to see my passport, which, legally, there is no reason your office needs to see this.

I HOPE THAT THESE COPIES FINALLY SOLVE THE PROBLEM.

I only say all of this because your office has caused me much stress over this matter (having an expired visa is cause for arrest, imprisonment–and deportation here—quite harsh punishments—and quite racist, as a matter of fact). So, your office has caused me much worry and wasted time on this matter.

It really makes me wonder if I have been singled out for harassment because I am a union member at Kandai. I will forward a copy of this to my union president, just so my union is aware of this issue. (Ueno-sama, I realize that you are only doing what you are told—but the people in the office should make it a point to understand the law.)
Sincerely,< < __._,_.___ ENDS

Japan Times: Foreigner registration revision to include ID chip, probably same policing function

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Jun Hongo got on this–the system comes more into focus. NHK said Jan 27 that Gaijin Cards will be replaced with IC Cards, too… Debito

==============================

Foreigner registration system to be revised
May lead to better services, more control
The Japan Times: Saturday, Jan. 26, 2008
By JUN HONGO, Staff writer
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20080126a1.html

The government plans to abolish the current registration system for foreigners living in Japan and introduce a new regime similar to that for Japanese residents that will manage them on a household basis, Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama said Friday.

The new arrangement, which is being examined by a team at the Justice Ministry and the internal affairs ministry, is expected to introduce a new registry system under which detailed information of foreign residents on a household basis, instead of an individual basis, will be kept by local governments.

Critics view the new system, however, as increased state control.

Under the current general registration law it is a requirement for foreign residents’ births, deaths and marriages to be reported. But the new alien registration law will make it easier for local governments to collect such information from foreigners.

Local officials often claim it is difficult for them to provide foreign nationals with information in areas such as school enrollment, health insurance and residence tax procedures. Some are also concerned about crimes committed by foreign nationals.

While the new system may help local authorities improve their services for foreign residents, some critics say it is likely to increase governmental control over foreign residents in Japan.

Hatoyama said Friday he hopes to submit a bill to abolish the current Alien Registration Law to enable the new arrangement to be passed in the next ordinary Diet session. The plan surfaced as a result of the government’s decision last June to revise the foreign registration system by 2009 to better cope with local government needs.

“Details have not been finalized and we are not at the point of revealing” the new regulations, a spokesman for the Immigration Control Office said, but the finalized outline of the law is expected to be released this spring.

Under the Alien Registration Law enacted in 1952, all foreigners in Japan are obliged to apply for registration with the local government of their residence.

Currently, only photographs, passport and registration forms are required for the process, which are used to clarify matters pertaining to their residence and status. There were 2.08 million registered foreigners in Japan at the end of 2006.

The government is also considering replacing the current alien registration cards, which foreign residents are required to carry at all times, with a new certificate card.

Under the new system, long-term foreign residents will get registration cards at airports and local immigration offices, which will then be used to register their information at local governments.

The data will be controlled in a similar manner as for Japanese citizens, and used to compile information for taxation, health insurance programs and census-taking. Special permanent residents, including those in Japan before the war and their descendants, are also expected to be listed in the new registry system.

Makoto Miyaguchi, an official of Minokamo, Gifu Prefecture, which has a large Brazilian population, said the current law is not sufficient to provide administrative services for foreigners in his city.

“Since the current system does not gather detailed information, we have often been unable to give adequate services for foreigners in the area,” including school guidance for parents and information on welfare services, he said.

Approximately 10 percent, or 50,000 residents, in Minokamo are registered foreigners.

Miyaguchi said that both his city and its foreign population will benefit from the overall detailed management, since it will be able to better track locations and the status of foreign individuals and households.

But while some suggest that the new system will view foreigners as legitimate residents instead of objects of supervision, others say it will only strengthen government control over foreigners while providing minimal improvement in their lives.

Yoji Shimada, a Tochigi Prefecture-based public notary, said that although a change in the defective Alien Registration Law is welcome, the proposal so far shows no extensive improvement.

“Foreigners will still be listed on a separate ledger from Japanese residents, and they will most likely be required to carry their IDs at all times,” said Shimada, who is married to a Thai.

Shimada said that information on households may become more accessible by local governments, but discriminatory clauses will likely remain. “The Justice Ministry will have better control and more information on foreigners in Japan — and that seems to be the only change in the proposal for the new law,” he said.

The Japan Times: Saturday, Jan. 26, 2008
ENDS

Kyodo: MOJ says GOJ to scrap NJ registration system and Gaijin Cards

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog: Could the rumors have been true after all?

=============================
Gov’t plans to scrap registration system on foreign nationals
TOKYO, Jan. 25 KYODO NEWS
Courtesy Martyn Williams
http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=359649

(EDS: UPDATING WITH ADDITIONAL INFO)
The government plans to scrap the current registration system for foreign nationals living in Japan and introduce a new resident registry system similar to that for Japanese residents, Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama said Friday.

”We are moving in the direction of deciding to abolish it,” Hatoyama told a press conference, indicating the Justice Ministry and the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry are working to craft a bill to that end to submit in next year’s ordinary parliamentary session.

Under the current registration system, the personal data of foreign nationals living in Japan, including their address and marital status, are registered only on an individual basis and not on a household basis, hampering local municipalities from grasping the situation of foreign residents in Japan.

Since foreign residents are not obliged to report to municipalities a change of address, it has also been difficult for the authorities to provide foreign nationals with information in areas such as school enrollment, health insurance, and residence tax procedures.

The move to scrap the system comes amid mounting calls for action from local municipalities with growing populations of foreign nationals such as Brazilians of Japanese descent. Some of the children of such residents are failing to enroll in local schools at the appropriate times.

”We are unable to properly notify families having school-age children of necessary information on school enrollment,” an official from the town of Oizumi, Gunma Prefecture, where foreign nationals account for about 16 percent of the overall population.

A social insurance consultant from the town, Shuichi Ono, said, ”Some foreign residents frequently move from one place to another. Once they return to their home countries, it is not easy to send them residence tax notifications.”

Under the envisioned registration system, information on foreign residents will be handled on a household basis as well.

The government is also considering replacing the current alien registration cards, which foreign residents are required to carry at all times, with a new certificate card.
=============================
ENDS

COMMENT: Pinch me. Let’s keep an eye on this one, people, as it’s fundamental to our lives in Japan–and getting rid of the Gaijin Card could be the best news we’ve had all decade. It all depends on what goes in its place. What’s with this “certificate card”, and will not carrying it 24-7 still be a criminal offense?

As commenters below put well, it’s not like any government to give up a means of control over people, especially when you consider that practically all governments to some degree control information about their foreigners (not to mention their citizens). But imagine if the Gaijin Card Checks actually became somehow less nasty (or even nonexistent–but that’s sky pie at this point), and NJ were actually formally registered as “residents” with some kind of juuminhyou?

In sum, will the new system be a way to ensure all people regardless of nationality are informed of and guaranteed the fruits of Japanese society? Or will it still just be a means to police them?

If you see any more articles before I do, please add them to the Comments section in full text with links. Thanks. Arudou Debito in Tokyo

Komeito leader agrees with DPJ proposal to give NJ Permanent Residents the right to vote

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Do I hear the sound of a wedge being driven into the ruling LDP/Komeito coalition? Debito in Tokyo

/////////////////////////////////////////////////
Komeito leader welcomes Ozawa’s proposal to give foreigners voting rights
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/news/20080124p2a00m0na011000c.html
Courtesy of Stephen Vowles

Kazuo Kitagawa, secretary-general of ruling coalition partner Komeito, has voiced support for opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) leader Ichiro Ozawa’s suggestion of considering submitting a bill to give foreigners with permanent residence status the right to vote in local elections.

“I would like a bill to be compiled and submitted,” Kitagawa said of the proposed move, adding that there had been arguments against it within the DPJ. “If they compiled it I would welcome that,” he said.

In a news conference on Tuesday, Ozawa said, “I’ve stressed before that the right for foreigners to vote in local elections should be granted. I’ve been criticized by long-time supporters, but the bottom line doesn’t change.”

There has been a strong tendency within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to take a cautious approach over granting foreigners with permanent residence status the right to vote in local elections. In 2005 Komeito submitted its own bill to the Diet, and the bill remains under deliberation.

Some LDP members have expressed concern over Ozawa’s comments, calling them a move to break up the ruling coalition.
/////////////////////////////////////////////////
ENDS

朝日：永住外国人の選挙権案、与党揺るがす火種　民主提出方針

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

永住外国人の選挙権案、与党揺るがす火種　民主提出方針

永住外国人の選挙権案、与党揺るがす火種　民主提出方針
朝日新聞　2008年01月24日08時08分
http://www.asahi.com/politics/update/0124/TKY200801230409.html

永住外国人に地方自治体の選挙権を認める法案が、与党の結束を揺さぶる波乱要因となる可能性が出てきた。在日韓国人を中心に待望論があり、公明党などが繰り返し提出してきたが、そのつど自民党内から反発が出て成立していない。ところが、民主党の小沢代表が成立に向けて踏み出し、公明党がその動きに期待を表明した。民主党案が提出されれば、与野党で賛否が入り乱れる構図となりそうだ。

「ぜひ党内をまとめ、提出してもらいたい。私としては歓迎だ」

公明党の北側一雄幹事長は２３日の記者会見で、民主党の動きをこう評した。さらに、自民党内の保守色の強い議員らの反発を念頭に「自民党内でも理解いただけるようお願いしたい」とも語り、今国会での成立に向け、自民党の協力に期待を表明した。

この法案は、公明党にとって自民党と連立を組んだ当初からの悲願だった。連立参画を翌年に控えた９８年に当時の新党平和として提出したのを皮切りに、これまでに衆院だけで計５回提出。しかし、自民党の賛否がまとまらずに廃案を繰り返し、５回目の法案は継続審議となっている。

ところが、ここにきて最近にない「追い風」が吹いてきた。参院第１党の民主党が小沢代表主導で独自に法案提出に動き出した。そして何より、福田政権になって、こうした法案に理解を示す議員らの発言力が強まってきているのだ。２３日には、参院の代表質問で自民党の鶴保庸介氏（二階派）が人権擁護法案の成立を促し、福田首相も「人権擁護は重要な課題だ。政府も真摯（しんし）な検討を図る」と応じた。

ただ、道は平坦（へいたん）ではない。２２日にあった中川昭一氏が会長を務める「真・保守政策研究会」の会合で、最高顧問の平沼赳夫氏がこうのろしを上げた。「２年余り前に幕を下ろした人権擁護法案のほか、外国人の地方参政権問題も動きが出てきた。我々は、いわゆる保守の旗をしっかりと掲げていかねばならない」

民主党は週明けにも、法案とりまとめに向け議員連盟を発足させる。小沢代表自らが旗をふり、約５０人が参加する見通しだ。

「我々がまとめれば、公明党を追い込んでいける。そうしたら自民党はどうしようもない」。小沢氏は１８日の韓国特使との会談で、今国会に法案提出する狙いをこう説明した。民主党が動けば公明党も同調し、慎重論が強い自民党との間を分断できる、という読みだ。

もちろん、民主党内にも異論はくすぶる。００年７月を最後に提出していないのも、議員連盟で法案作成を進める手法をとるのも反対意見に配慮するためだ。だが、政局優先で小沢代表が主導していることから、最終的にはまとまるものとみられている。

〈永住外国人地方選挙権付与法案〉　日本に永住が認められた２０歳以上の外国人による申請をもとに、地方自治体の首長や議員の投票権を認める法案。最高裁が９５年に「（選挙権付与は）憲法上禁止されていない」との判断を示し、在日本大韓民国民団を中心に地方選挙権を求める運動が広がった。９８年以降、公明、共産両党などが法案提出を繰り返している。
ends

Speech at Waseda Jan 22, 5PM, on Japan’s Immigration and Human Rights Record

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. As promised, here are the details of my upcoming speech Tuesday evening, speaking with Amnesty and Waseda professor in a joint roundtable. Attend if you like. I’m speaking for 20 minutes… Debito in Tokyo

WASEDA UNIVERSITY DOCTORAL STUDENT NETWORK PRESENTS
JANUARY 22, 2008 5PM
FEATURED SPEAKERS:

Implications of Japanese domestic human rights record (for foreign residents or Japanese) on Asian Integration

==================================
SPEAKER ONE:
Implications of Domestic Human Rights Practices on Asian Regional Integration

ARUDOU Debito (BA Cornell, 1987; MPIA UC San Diego, 1991) is a naturalized Japanese citizen and Associate Professor at Hokkaido　Information University. A human rights activist, he has authored two books, Japaniizu Onrii–Otaru Onsen Nyuuyoku Kyohi Mondai to Jinshu Sabetsu and its English version (Akashi Shoten 2003 and 2004, updated2006), and is currently at work on a bilingual handbook for immigrants to Japan. He also puts out a regular newsletter and columns for The Japan Times. His extensive bilingual website on human rights issues and living in Japan is available at https://www.debito.org

Abstract
Japan is at another one of those crossroads–where it could either head down the path of other developed countries, accepting migration and immigration as a natural part of global interdependence (preserving an economic and demographic vitality), or else become an economic backwater with an aged society, leapfrogged by China as Asia’s regional representative to the world. Official trends, including increased registering, policing, and scare campaigns towards non-Japanese entrants and residents, have tended towards the latter. However, the last two decades of economic and labor policy have been clearly towards importing unskilled workers to replace Japanese in the less savory 3K industries. This gap has made work and living conditions for many non-Japanese in Japan unequal and difficult, as they receive few constitutional or legal protections against discrimination. Moreover, many receive no labor rights whatsoever by dint of their visa. The speaker, an activist, columnist, and author on issues of discrimination, will discuss his research and activism. He will also allude to how Japan’s treatment of migrants and immigrants is a reflection of its attitudes towards its Asian neighbors, and towards regional cooperation and integration in this age of globalization and economic interdependence.
Presentation in English

==================================

SPEAKER TWO:
「Implications of Japanese domestic human rights record (for foreign residents or Japanese) on Asian Integration from the perspective of an NGO and in particular Amnesty International Japan」

Sonoko Kawakami, Official Representative, Amnesty International Japan
川上園子 (E-mail：ksonoko@amnesty.or.jp)
社団法人アムネスティ・インターナショナル日本 (ホームページ：http://www.amnesty.or.jp/)
★アムネスティ・メールマガジンのお申し込みはこちらから！ http://www.amnesty.or.jp/) http://secure.amnesty.or.jp/campaign/
Presentation in Japanese

==================================

COMMENTATOR

Associate Professor Yasushi Katsuma
Field of specialization:
Peace and Human Security; International Human Rights; Theories of Social Development; United Nations Studies

Prof. Katsuma was a consultant for Japanese ODA, conducting development research in Asia and Latin America. After obtaining his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, based on his dissertation study in Bolivia, Prof. Katsuma joined the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and worked in Mexico, Afghanistan/Pakistan and Tokyo, as international civil servant. Based on his experiences both in the academia and in the practice of international cooperation, Prof. Katsuma hopes to support the academic training necessary for those who wish to contribute to the international community. He also believes that it is important to approach the global issues from the perspective of the most vulnerable people, linking academic theories with empirical data from the field.

日時 ：　　　2008年　1月　22日（火） 　 午後 5時～7時
Date ：　　　Tuesday January 22　 　　 17：00～19：00
会場 ：　　　西早稲田 ビル　19号館 710号室 　
Venue ：　　　Sodai-Nishiwaseda Bldg 19 Room 710 　　　
主催 / Organized by ：　　WUDSN　 協力 / Supported by ：　　GIARI
申込不要、自由入場 　/ 　Open to public, Free of Charge
http://www.waseda.jp/gsaps/WUDSN/WUDSNindex.htm
ENDS

ABC Radio Australia: “Expatriates concerned by plans for Japanese language tests”

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Here’s another one for your consideration. Debito

==============================
Expatriates concerned by plans for Japanese language tests
ABC Radio Australia 18/01/2008, 14:11:18
Listen to it at http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/connectasia/stories/s2141423.htm

Text from http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/connectasia/stories/s2141423.htm

Plans to introduce language tests for foreigners wishing to live and work in Japan has prompted concerns from the expatriate community.

Japan’s foreign minister, Masahiko Komura, made the announcement on Tuesday, and the foreign ministry told Radio Australia the department should pursue the terms of the new requirement quickly.

The plans, announced just months after the country began photographing and finger-printing all foreign nationals on entry to Japan, have not been taken well in many quarters of Japan’s expatriate community.

Dave Aldwinckle has been a permanent resident in Japan since 1996, and is married to a Japanese with two children.

The author, columnist and human rights campaigner, who goes by the Japanese name, Arudou Debito, told Radio Australia over a million people will be affected by the move.

“And millions more if you include their families as well that are Japanese,” he said.

“To pass them all off as potential terrorists is worse than callous, in my view, it’s unappreciation for the work that people have done over here already,” Mr Aldwinckle said.

‘Another arbitrary hurdle

He says while he believes anyone wanting to live in Japan should be able to read, write and speak Japanese, it will be difficult to test and enforce.

“It’s another potentially arbitrary hurdle to put up in front of foreigners that, given the past government enforcement of policy, I’m a little bit concerned about how this is going to be enforced as well,” he said.

Dr Chris Burgess, of Tsuda College in Tokyo, says the proposed language test for foreigners is going to harm Japan in a multitude of ways.

“The new regulations, supposedly aimed at eradicating illegal residents, is just going to push them underground more than anything,” Dr Burgess told Radio Australia.

“I think, in some ways this is a poorly thought out policy and just a knee-jerk reaction to public attitudes which demand more to be done to tackle the foreign crime – a myth that you see in newspapers all the time, that foreigners are criminals; unfounded statistically, but that’s the myth.”

The Secretary General of the International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism, Professor Mushakoji Kinhide, has another theory about the language test.

“It is, more or less, a general position of the Liberal Democratic Party leadership about the so-called overseas, Japanese-origin, Latin American migrants,” Professor Kinhide said.

The ‘Nikkei-jin’ factor

The deputy director of the Foreign Nationals Affairs Division in Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Terasawa Genichi, told Radio Australia that ‘Nikkei-jin’ – returning Japanese emigrants and their descendants living outside of Japan – are indeed a focus in the proposed language test.

Declining an interview, Mr Terasawa did, however, stipulate that the test was not targetting any particular ethnic group.

Professor Mushakoji says the group has caused problems before.

“Unfortunately the Japanese-descent, young people who come do not necessarily speak Japanese and have very genuine cultural habits which are quite different from the Japanese and so there has been a few cases of cultural problems – Brazilian-Japanese will tend to sing and dance and be quite different in their behaviour at night,” he said.

In 2006, the then-foreign minister, Taro Aso, described Japan as “one nation, one civilisation, one language, one culture, and one race”.

Professor Mushakoji is therefore concerned about the comments of the new Foreign Minister, Masahiko Komura.

“If Komura has repeated the statement already made by Aso it is a manifestation of the Japanese government not to admit that Japan will gradually have to turn into a multicultural country and insist on keeping Japan as a homogenous society,” Professor Mushakoji said.

Naturalised Japanese citizen, Dave Aldwinckle feels, like many others, unduly targeted.

“Well, foreigners aren’t like Japanese, there’s no commonality, the Japanese are unique, etc,” he said.

“If you keep playing that button the Government can keep getting budgets for anti-terrorism moves which will eventually target disenfranchised foreigners – hey, foreigners can’t vote.”
———————————-

Full story available on the Connect Asia website: http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/connectasia/

GOJ floats trial balloon: Japanese language improvement for visas

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. This has made a huge splash in cyberspace, so I guess we’d better take it up here too:

/////////////////////////////////////////////////
Japan May Require Foreign Residents to Know Japanese (Update 3)
By Sachiko Sakamaki and Toko Sekiguchi
Bloomberg News, January 15, 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601101&sid=a34ozVmUjMUU
Courtesy Ben Shearon, Rita Short, Louis Butto, Matthew Simko, Akita Laura, and many others… Discussion at http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/425041 and many other places.

Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) — Japan may consider requiring long- term resident (chouki taizai) foreigners to have local language ability, Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura said today, without saying to what degree the language would have to be learned.

Komura said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Justice plan to start discussing the possible requirement. Komura didn’t say when the meeting would take place or provide further details on which residents might be affected.

Japan’s mulling of a language requirement may hint at preparations to accept — rather than reject — more migrants, said Hidenori Sakanaka, director of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute in Tokyo and formerly head of the Justice Ministry’s Tokyo immigration office. Officials realize that Japan’s aging society and pending labor shortage obliges them to boost immigration.

“I think this is a preparation for that,” Sakanaka said. “It’s a global trend to require language ability for immigrants to integrate them into society.”

Japan’s labor force will shrink to 55.8 million in 2030 from 66.6 million in 2006 if more women and the elderly aren’t allowed to work, according to a labor ministry report.

“This shows that the government and business circles want to increase foreign workers,” said Ippei Torii, secretary general of Solidarity Network with Migrants Japan, an advocacy group for foreign laborers in Tokyo. A language rule, however, may prevent some workers from coming and may force non-Japanese speakers to leave, he said.

‘Quality of Life’

Komura said officials may not necessarily deny foreigners long-term residency just because they have no Japanese language ability. Establishing language as one criterion for residency would improve foreigners’ quality of life in Japan and encourage foreign students to learn Japanese abroad, he said.

“There are positive and negative aspects” of a language requirement, Komura said during a press conference in Tokyo today. “Because there may be more positive aspects we’re going to consider it.”

Wenzhou Song, 44, a consultant who founded the Tokyo software company Softbrain Co., said a language rule shouldn’t exclude talented people from immigrating.

“It’s a very difficult line to draw,” he said. “It makes sense to require long-term residents to speak the local language but you can’t make the requirement too harsh or you will discourage people who want to come to Japan.”

Song spoke little Japanese when he came to Japan from China as a student in 1985, he said.

On Nov. 20 Japan began fingerprinting and photographing foreigners entering the country to prevent terrorism.

To contact the reporters on this story: Sachiko Sakamaki in Tokyo at Ssakamaki1@bloomberg.net ; Toko Sekiguchi in Tokyo at Tsekiguchi3@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: January 15, 2008 01:53 EST
ENDS
/////////////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: As I told a reporter from ABC Radio Australia in an interview today (should be online fairly soon at http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/), I agree that Japanese language proficiency (meaning reading, writing, and speaking) is crucial for life in Japan. Functional illiteracy in any society is deprivational–it limits your world and voids your ability to control your fate here. And incentives should be there for those who are willing to make the investment and learn the lingua franca.

However, the GOJ as usual is making the incentives a matter of sticks, not carrots. Learn or we boot you out. No suggestion of how the GOJ is going to make it easier for NJ to learn–free language classes, for example, paid for by national and/or local governments, are de rigeur in other societies (such as the USA).

Other problems:

1) It is unclear what “long-term resident” (chouki taizai suru gaikokujin in Japanese) actually means. That could mean anyone from a one-year visa, to several one-year visas, all the way up to Permanent Resident. Are we saying that people who apply for PR will also have to take a language test? What “level of improvement” counts as valid at each stage? How high will that bar be raised the longer you stay?

2) It seems like yet another hurdle put up to keep the tide of immigration in check. With all the other languages out there with more use in other countries (English, for example, or even Spanish or French), are people going to be willing to put in all this investment in language just for the dubious honor of paying taxes, being treated like second-class residents with few labor rights and even fewer human rights, being assigned only 3K jobs with little chance of advancement (and no guarantee of education for their children), and being told in the end anyway they don’t belong here phenotypically–when they could just bog off to another set of countries where one language works for all of them instead? Nihongo is limited to this archipelago. Other multicultural languages beckon. Japan risks being passed by again.

3) How is this “language test” going to be administered? Is there a clear standard and grading regime, or is it just something administered by haughty Immigration officials–or worse yet, corporate bosses, to hold over their NJ employees like a Sword of Damocles? “You don’t speak like we do. You still have an accent. Either take a pay cut or we won’t approve your language improvement certificate and you’ll lose your visa”. And if there is a family of visas involved, what happens if some members of the family pass and others don’t?

I repeat, in principle, I think everyone should learn Japanese if they’re going to live here. But as I wrote before when this proposal was first floated years ago (Komura saying it now came as no surprise to me–it’s been in the pipeline; see links below), this requires more homework and concrete policy before floating anything as complicated as this as a mere policy trial balloon.

Previous mentions at Debito.org at
https://www.debito.org/?p=105
https://www.debito.org/?p=443
https://www.debito.org/?p=277

It’s saddening that even though it’s been a policy topic for more than a year, little seems to have been done to make it more sophisticated by now. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

毎日：入国や在留審査で日本語能力を重視へ　政府

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

来日外国人：入国や在留審査で日本語能力を重視へ　政府
毎日新聞　2008年1月15日
http://mainichi.jp/select/world/news/20080116k0000m010023000c.html

　政府は日本に長期滞在する外国人の入国や在留許可審査の際、日本語能力を要件として重視する具体策を外務、法務両省が検討することを決めた。就労目的などで増加傾向にある外国人が地域社会に溶け込みやすい環境整備につなげるとともに、来日する外国人にも日本語学習意欲を高めてもらうのが狙い。

　高村正彦外相が１５日の閣議後会見で明らかにした。外相は「日本語能力は、外国人自身の生活の質を高めるためにも、日本社会のためにも大切」と強調したうえで「『日本へ行くために日本語を勉強しよう』という機運が高まれば大変よいことだ」と述べた。

　具体的には、入国時の上陸審査基準に日本語能力を新たに盛り込むかどうかや、在留期間の更新、資格変更時に日本語能力の向上について確認するなど、何らかの形で考慮することが検討対象となる見通し。外務省によると、カナダでは就労目的の永住者が査証申請時に提出する略歴で、語学力を含む６項目をポイント化し、総ポイント数に応じて許可。英国、ドイツ、フランスで語学能力を重視する移民政策を取っているという。

　ただ、政府内には、要件を厳しくすることで「査証（ビザ）の発給・更新などに影響が生じ、貴重な人材が入国できなくなる可能性もある」との課題を指摘する声もある。【上野央絵】

毎日新聞　2008年1月15日　18時12分　（最終更新時間　1月15日　23時34分）

Mark Mino-Thompson on “updated” Hotel Laws: Refusal OK if “unreasonable/unrational burden”

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Mark Mino-Thompson reports below on his discovery of new “amendments” to the Ryokan Gyouhou (Hotel Management Law), created in English and Japanese legalese and in generic format (meaning written by somebody else) for use in hotels nationwide. They are vague enough to make it seem as though a hotel could refuse a NJ lodging if the lodger poses an “unreasonable/unrational burden” (such as speaking a foreign language or offering beds instead of futons?). Copies of the laws linked below. Debito in Sapporo

============================
From: Mark Mino-Thompson
Subject: [Community] Hotels asking for passports from residents in Japan
Date: January 8, 2008 11:22:07 AM JST
To: The Community Yahoogroup

My family and I went to an Onsen hotel over the holidays. While the reservation was in my name (My wife’s family name + my first name in katakana), my sister-in-law handled the front desk registration, as we were busy with our kids. They didn’t request to see my passport or other ID, although as I wasn’t checking in directly, I can’t say what would have happened if I had been. I did notice that they did have the standard multilingual “May we see your passport?” sign Debito has posted before, featured on the front desk.

Later that day, while reading through the hotel information, I came across the Terms and Conditions for accommodation, printed in Japanese and English. Firstly, I noticed that much like others I’ve seen in various hotels over the past two years erroneously states in Article 8 that:

“The guest shall register the following particulars at the front desk of the Ryokan/Hotel on the day of accommodation: (1) Name, age, sex, address, and occupation of the guest(s) (2) For non Japanese: nationality, passport number, port and date of entry in Japan
newarticle8_eng.jpg
newarticle8_jp.jpg

This is nothing new. There have been many accounts from others about this error in Japanese hotel documentation. However, the Japanese version also seems to be the same wording as in English.

I’ve attached a scan of the original documents in the files section of the Community yahoogroups site. (Too big to put here as image or thumbnail–see them at Debito.org here:)

English: https://www.debito.org/newhotellaws2008eng.jpg

Japanese:
https://www.debito.org/newhotellaws2008j.jpg

Furthermore, as Debito has mentioned and documented before, the Hotel law article 5 states that accomodation can only be refused by the hotel in the case of:

1) a health issue involving contagious disease, 2) a clear and present endangerment of public morals, or 3) because all rooms are full.

However, this hotel terms and conditions Article 5 has additional (new?), disturbing provisions:

Article 5 (Refusal of Accommodation Contracts)

The Ryokan/Hotel may not accept the conclusion of an Accommodation Contract under any of the following cases:

(1) When the application for accommodation does not conform with these Terms and Conditions

(2) When the Ryokan/Hotel is fully booked and no room is available

(3) When the Guest seeking accommodation is deemed liable to conduct himself in a manner that will contravene the laws or act against the public order or good morals

(4) When the guest is clearly detected as carrying an infectious disease

(5) When the Ryokan/Hotel is requested to assume an unreasonable burden in regard to his accommodation [shukuhaku ni kanshi gouriteki na han’i o koeru futan o motomerareta toki–literally, “at times when the burden demanded in terms of staying has superseded the bounds of rationality/reasonability”–there we go with that easily-abusable “gouriteki sabetsu” “rational discrimination” concept again…]

(6) When the Ryokan/Hotel is unable to provide accommodation due to natural calamities, disfunction of the facilities and or other unavoidable causes, or

(7) When the provisions of Article 5 of Iwate Metropolitan/Prefecture Ordinance are applicable.

newarticle5_eng.jpg
newarticle5_jp.jpg
As you can see, clause number 1 seems to me to have a rather broad range of powers to refuse accommodation. Fail to give up your passport/ID to the front desk and we can deny you a room because you’re not conforming to Article 7 of our Accommodation Contract.

Clause number 5 also is troubling to me. What constitutes an “unreasonable burden” and who decides? Does having Japanese customers complaining about foreign bathers and demanding refunds allow the hotel to refuse non-Japanese out of fear of losing customers? Does not having English-speaking (or other language) staff cause “unreasonable burden” to rural hotels and allow them to turn away people as well?

Clause 7 I haven’t researched as of yet, but it seems that ordinances created at the prefectural level may have the power to refuse others as well.

In addition, these Terms and Conditions, similar to the multilingual front desk signs made by the Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare (that Debito has mentioned) seem to be quite professionally made. They are professionally printed on glossy paper, refer to “the Ryokan/Hotel” instead of the actual hotel name and the fact that the English legalese is high and above the ability of most English-speaking hotel clerks would suggest that they were made at either the prefectural (or more likely national) level for all hotels to use.

Any thoughts or comments on my interpretation of this document? Any suggestions or a course of action to get these documents corrected to accurately reflect the new passport ordinance for non-resident visitors and the hotel law itself?

Regards, Mark Mino-Thompson
ENDS

Yomiuri: DPJ pushing bill for NJ voting rights in local elections

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Here’s some very good news. Somebody at least is recognizing the reality that you can’t keep people who live here permanently for generations permanently disenfranchised from the democratic process. One more reason to support the DPJ (or the New Komeito, depending on your politics–hopefully enticing it out of its Faustian deal with the devil just to share power with the LDP).

Wouldn’t it be interesting if in the end what made the LDP finally fall from power was issues of immigration and assimilation? Arudou Debito in Sapporo

====================================

DPJ lawmakers to push foreigner suffrage bill
The Yomiuri Shimbun, Jan. 7, 2008
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20080107TDY03102.htm
Courtesy of Chris Gunson

Lawmakers in the Democratic Party of Japan are stepping up efforts to resubmit a bill that would grant permanent foreign residents the right to vote in local elections, according to sources.

With New Komeito also strongly demanding local suffrage for permanent foreign residents, DPJ lawmakers hope in the upcoming Diet session “to split the ruling camp by submitting the bill to the House of Councillors and call on New Komeito to endorse it,” according to one of the sources.

But some conservative lawmakers in the party are determined to block the resubmission.

“Looking at this constitutionally and from the state of the nation, there’s no way we can approve this,” one party conservative said.

The DPJ previously submitted the bill to the House of Representatives on two occasions–in 1998 and 2002–but it was scrapped after failing to pass both times.

New Komeito also submitted to the lower house in 2005 a bill for granting permanent foreign residents voting rights in local elections, and discussions have spilled over into the current Diet session.

The passing of any bill of this nature has been stopped in its tracks mostly due to deep-rooted resistance mainly in the Liberal Democratic Party.

Yoshihiro Kawakami, a DPJ upper house member, plans to call on supporters in the party and establish a league of Diet members aimed at resubmitting the DPJ’s bill.

In the new bill, a “principle of reciprocity” will be introduced, in which local voting rights would only be granted to permanent residents who hold the nationality of a country that allows foreigners to vote in elections.

“New Komeito’s proposed bill has for sometime contained the principle of reciprocity, and so New Komeito won’t be able to oppose the DPJ’s bill,” Kawakami said.

Kawakami and his supporters hope to gain approval from the party leadership and submit the bill for prior consideration by the upper house. (Jan. 7, 2008)
ENDS

読売：外国人の地方参政権法案、民主内で再提出の動き

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

外国人の地方参政権法案、民主内で再提出の動き
　永住外国人に地方参政権を付与する法案を巡り、民主党内で次期通常国会に再提出を目指す動きが活発化してきた。
2008年1月5日21時23分 読売新聞
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/politics/news/20080105ia22.htm

　地方参政権付与は公明党が強く求めており、「参院に民主党が法案を提出し、公明党に賛成を呼びかければ、与党の分断を図ることができる」との狙いからだ。ただ、党内の保守派議員は「憲法上も、国のあり方という観点からも、絶対に認められない」として阻止する構えだ。

　民主党は、同法案を１９９８年と２０００年の２度にわたって衆院に提出したが、いずれも成立せず、廃案となった。一方、公明党は０５年に衆院に「永住外国人地方選挙権付与法案」を提出、今国会でも継続審議になっている。自民党を中心に慎重論が根強いことが背景にある。

　民主党の川上義博参院議員は、党内の有志議員に呼びかけ、民主党案の再提出を目指す議員連盟を近く結成する方針だ。今回の法案には、相手国で外国人に対する選挙権を認めている場合にのみ、その国の国籍を持つ人に選挙権を付与する「相互主義」を新たに採用することを検討している。「公明党案にも、当分の間は相互主義をとることが盛り込まれており、公明党も民主党案に反対できなくなる」との判断がある。

　民主党の小沢代表は、「一定の要件のもとに地方参政権を与えるべきだ」と主張してきた経緯がある。川上氏らは、党執行部の賛同を得て、参院先議で法案を提出したい考えだ。

　これに対し、党内の保守派議員は「選挙権は、日本国籍を有する者に対してのみ保障されている。政局的な狙いから、『国のかたち』をゆがめるべきではない」と反発している。

（2008年1月5日21時23分 読売新聞）

Humor: Charles Kowalski letter to Yomiuri on Ishiba’s UFO fears

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. This is so good I couldn’t just let it languish within the comments section of this blog. It deserves an entry all its own.

Charles Kowalski sent this letter to the Yomiuri when Defense Minister Hashiba (inter alia) was getting all nerdy about defenses against a theoretical UFO invasion late last year. Charles takes the issue and runs with it. Hilariously. The Yomiuri, not known for any sense of humor (or for brooking any criticism of Japan from outsiders), wouldn’t publish it. So I will. Debito in Sapporo

/////////////////////////////////////////

UNPUBLISHED LETTER TO THE EDITOR AT THE YOMIURI, BY CHARLES KOWALSKI:

To Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba:

I urge you to reconsider your comment that UFOs “can’t be categorized as coming from a foreign country” (Yomiuri December 21, page 2). Please take a moment to think about the dangerous precedents this policy would set.

If UFOs could enter Japanese airspace without resistance, they could easily spirit away Japanese citizens. Japan has enough abduction issues already! But even worse, what if the extraterrestrial visitors liked our beautiful country so much that they decided to stay – and without the limitations that apply to humans from other countries?

First of all, with no visa restrictions, they could take jobs away from Japanese citizens. In the fields of astrophysics and aeronautics, an interstellar pilot would have a grossly unfair advantage over a Japanese graduate who shuffled through university with a perpetual hangover. Do you want more of our young people to become NEETs?

And if men from Mars, or women from Venus, were to marry Japanese citizens, what would prevent their names from being recorded in the juminhyo? Tama-chan was cute as a one-time joke, but do you really want to see Qrlzak Wzaxo from Jupiter listed on equal terms with Hanako Sato from Morioka? And their children, with one parent from a planet with higher gravity, would always beat their Japanese classmates in athletic competitions! How unsporting!

Our course of action should be clear: Treat extraterrestrials the same as any other aliens. When they arrive at the UFO terminal at Narita, take prints of their claws, tentacles, antennae or whatever they use for fingers. Make them carry Space Alien Registration Cards that the police could inspect at any time. Interplanetarization is all very well, but we Japanese must take measures to prevent these aliens from going where no gaijin has gone before.
ENDS

Japan Focus: Michael H. Fox translates Justice Minister Hatoyama interview re capital punishment

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. I mentioned in my last Japan Times Article (December 18, 2007) the following oddity about our Justice Minister:

As the party cream floats to the top, debates become very closed-circuit, intellectually incestuous–and even oddly anti-gaijin. For example, Justice Minister Kunio “friend of a friend in al-Qaeda” Hatoyama was quoted as saying (Shuukan Asahi Oct 26, 2007 p. 122), “The Japanese place more importance on the value of life… European civilizations of power and war mean their concept of life is weaker than the Japanese. This is why they are moving towards abolishing the death penalty.” Then he approved three execution orders. Earth to Kunio, come in?

The thing is, there’s a lot more screwballity here. Here’s a link to the whole Shuukan Asahi interview I referred to translated by Michael H. Fox. I’ll excerpt Mike’s commentary here, but the interview is a long one, so I’ll let you go directly to the Japan Focus page for it.

Pretty remarkable opinions from a politico who has risen this far. Then again, as I’ve said, Japan’s parliament is a peerage in disguise, so for anyone who comes from a country with an inherited ensconced class, we all know what silly things their “upper-class twits” get up to. Pity they get elected and given this much unvetted political power here. Debito in Monbetsu
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

“Why I Support Executions”
An interview with Justice Minister Hatoyama Kunio
Translation and Commentary by Michael H. Fox
http://japanfocus.org/products/details/2609

COMMENTARY:

Hatoyama Kunio, current Justice Minister of Japan, is one of Japan’s most candid politicians. He has a penchant for speaking his mind, and startling the public, his party and even his ministry. In the wide ranging interview below, originally published in the weekly magazine Weekly Asahi (Shukan Asahi) on October 26 [2007], he sounds off on a number of timely and important issues regarding Japan’s justice system, particularly the death penalty, and upcoming changes to the socio-legal structure.

Hatoyama was born into a political dynasty. His father Seiichiro served in the Diet and was a Minister of Foreign Affairs. His grandfather Hatoyama Ichiro was Prime Minister from December 1954 to December 1956. And his great-grandfather Kazuo, served in the Diet and was president of Waseda University. His elder brother Yukio, is a Diet member and a leader of the opposition Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan). According to his website, Hatoyama declared that he would enter politics when he was in the second year of elementary school. His wish started to materialize when he became a secretary to Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei after graduating from Tokyo University’s Department of Law in 1972.

Hatoyama has had a long political career. Elected to the Diet in 1976, he has served as Education Minister and Labor Minister. He left the LDP in 1996, and was elected to the Diet as a Minshuto candidate. Three years later, he abandoned the party and resigned his seat in the Diet. He ran unsuccessfully for Governor of Tokyo in 1999. Soon after, he returned to the LDP and won a seat in the diet in 2000 under the system of proportional representation. He became Minister of Justice under previous Prime Minister Abe Shinzo in August of 2007, and continued in the post in the present cabinet of Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo. At what turned out to be the last press conference for the Abe cabinet, he suggested that “executions should be carried out automatically without involving the Minister of Justice.”

The comment sent shock waves through the country. The last step in the long process of trying, sentencing and finally executing a convicted criminal is the signature of the minister of justice. Once signed, the execution of a death warrant must be carried out within five days. The justice minister’s involvement in the process is so critical that several of Hatoyama’s predecessors refused to carry out executions.

As a result of his reluctance to sign death warrants and a desire to continue executions, Hatoyama was widely criticized. Kamei Shizuka, a former director of the National Police Agency and LDP bigwig, now represents The People’s New Party in the diet. He was progenitor of the non-partisan Parliamentary League for the Abolition of the Death Penalty. Hosaka Nobuto, a member of the Social Democratic Party, is one of the country’s most progressive politicians and an outspoken opponent of the death penalty.

In addition to the death penalty, Hatoyama has voiced opinions on other areas of the criminal justice system, including the upcoming quasi-jury system for major criminal trials scheduled to begin in May 2009. Suspects charged with committing crimes that carry a sentence of three years or more will have the right to a jury composed of three sitting judges and six citizens. While supporting the quasi-jury system, in this interview he attacks the policy of increasing the number of attorneys in Japan’s severely under-lawyered society. Currently, approximately 1,200 people, or roughly two percent of candidates pass the National Bar Exam and begin careers as lawyers, prosecutors, or judges. This number is scheduled to grow to 3,000 in the near future as the first crop of students graduate from newly established law schools.

Also mentioned in the interview is the Toyama Rape Case, a now infamous miscarriage of justice. In 2002, a man was wrongly convicted of rape and attempted rape in Toyama Prefecture and served twenty-five months in prison before being exonerated this year when the real culprit confessed. The conviction was based on a coerced confession and the suppression of exculpatory evidence. This case has galvanized public opinion and stimulated the need for greater transparency in police investigations, especially the filming of interrogations.

Hatoyama suggests that executions should be carried out automatically after an objective examination by a third party who will “review the transcripts.” However, no such system has ever been proposed or even discussed in Japan. The idea of an objective third party seems to be a face-saving measure designed to deflect the storm of criticism that followed Hatoyama’s comments. He also suggests that executions should only be carried out after retrial requests and petitions for amnesty have been exhausted. The Japanese Code of Criminal Procedure does not limit retrial requests — Sakae Menda, the first Japanese man freed from death row – went through six retrials. Likewise, the mention of amnesties is irrelevant: none have been granted since the mid 1970’s.

Other Hatoyama comments are puzzling. He mentions that “some countries do not even have laws banning jeopardy” as if to infer that Japan is superior in this respect. Though Article 39 of the constitution prohibits double jeopardy, the prosecution in Japan may appeal any verdict, and almost always appeals innocent verdicts and sentences considered too light. Likewise, his statement that “in Japan there is a right to silence, but in England, if you keep silent, this means you acknowledge guilt.” In fact the complete opposite is true. Silence in Japan is considered an acknowledgement of guilt.

Hatoyama’s preference for reducing the number of lawyers is reactionary and contrary to his ministry’s policy. The increase occurred after a long process of judicial policy making involving the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Education (which has set up law schools) and Parliament. All agreed that Japan has far too few lawyers, and is ill equipped for dealing with the complexities of International business law.

Hatoyama, like many of his LDP colleagues, has capitalized on the mostly docile electorate. An increase in lawyers, despite the pressing need, will certainly agitate this mind set. His comment about lawyers being unable to find work in contemporary Japan is completely askew from reality. His opinions indicate a deep mistrust of empowering the public and independent legal policy, and strong support for top-down decision making and bureaucratic control.

Just over a month after this interview was originally published, Hatoyama demonstrated his resolve to execute: three convicts, two in Tokyo and one in Osaka, were hung on December 7. Hatoyama’s imprint on the process was clear. In a clear break with previous policy, the ministry openly announced the names of the executed, and the crimes leading to conviction. From 1998, the ministry only announced the number of executions, omitting all other details. Before 1998, there were not even any announcements. In both cases the names of the executed were revealed only to attorneys and designated guarantors of the accused. These parties were charged with directly informing the press, or informing the public indirectly through the offices of Amnesty International.

The dramatic increase in executions –thirteen– over the last 12 months signifies a departure from policy. Double digit hangings in such a span have not occurred since 1975.

The flurry has generated a shock-wave of concern in a society trying to grapple with a rapidly ageing population: three of those executed have been over age 70. Akiyama Yoshimitsu, one of four convicts hung on Christmas Day 2006, became the oldest person executed in post-war Japan. Aged 77 and quite infirm, he was transported to the gallows in a wheel chair. Ikemoto Noboru, executed in Osaka on December 7th, was hung two weeks before his 75th birthday. Originally sentenced to life imprisonment, his sentence was raised to death upon appeal. Had the government allowed the original sentence to stand, Ikemoto would most likely have been paroled in 2006, eighteen years into his sentence.

INTERVIEW:
Go to
http://japanfocus.org/products/details/2609
ENDS

読売：活動家入国阻止、洞爺湖サミットにフーリガン条項適用へ

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

活動家入国阻止、洞爺湖サミットにフーリガン条項適用へ
（2007年12月30日13時31分 読売新聞）
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/national/news/20071230i104.htm

　来年７月の北海道洞爺湖サミット（主要国首脳会議）の警備強化に備え、法務省は、「反グローバリズム活動家」の入国を阻止するため、出入国管理・難民認定法（入管法）の「フーリガン条項」を適用する準備に着手した。

　活動家への適用は初めてで、関係省庁が判断基準などを検討し、各国政府の情報を収集している。

　「フーリガン条項」は、２００２年のサッカー・ワールドカップ（Ｗ杯）日韓大会で、フーリガンの日本への入国を阻止する目的で、入管法を０１年に改正して加えられ、０２年に施行された。

　条項は、「過去に国際的規模の競技会や会議の円滑な実施を妨げるため、殺傷・暴行・脅迫・建造物破壊を行い、日本や他国で刑に処せられたり、退去させられたりした外国人が再び同様の行為をする恐れがある場合、上陸を拒否できる」との内容。

　同条項に基づき、０２年のＷ杯ではフーリガン１９人の入国を拒否した。しかし、これ以外の適用例はない。

　経済のグローバル化が貧富の差を拡大し、環境破壊をもたらすと主張する反グローバリズム運動には、労働組合や環境保護団体などがかかわることが多い。最近のサミットでも一部の活動家が過激なデモ活動を繰り広げ、特に、今年６月のドイツでのハイリゲンダム・サミットでは８万人規模のデモが発生。参加者の一部が暴徒化し、約１１００人が身柄を拘束された。

　入管法ではもともと、入国審査官が「入国目的が申請したものと異なる」と判断した場合、入国を拒否できるが、虚偽申請を見抜くのは容易ではない。また、活動家には、過去に刑を受けたり、退去させられたりした経歴を持つ“常習者”が多いため、法務省は、同条項が有効だと判断した。

　法務省はすでに、警察庁や外務省と連携し、活動家情報などの収集に入った。

（2007年12月30日13時31分 読売新聞）

Yomiuri: GOJ shutting out ‘hooligans’ (i.e. antiglobalization activists) from Hokkaido G-8 summit

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Today’s moral: All it takes is a new vague law to be passed, and the government will find ways to tweak it to filter out things at its own convenience.

Witness what’s going on in the Yomiuri article below with the “new immigration laws” (i.e. fingerprinting and photographing at the border for NJ only). First it was justified on the grounds of preventing terrorism in the Post-9/11 World. Then with the SARS Pneumonia outbreak in 2003 (seen as an illness only foreigners carry, which is why some hotels began banning foreign guests), suddenly it was also justifiable as a way to prevent infectious diseases. Then just as it was coming online it became an “anti-foreign crime” measure. Then right afterwards it became (with the stroke of a bureaucrat’s pen) a means to forcibly incarcerate anyone who doesn’t cooperate with immigration discretion for whatever reason.

And as of a few days ago, it’s going to be instrumental in keeping out “antiglobalization activists” (whatever that means)… It’s become an “anti-hooligan” measure. As though G-8 Summits are football matches.

It makes no sense until you look at it in terms of politics, not logic. The National Police Agency sold the J public on “anti-hooliganism” specifically before in 2002, during the World Cup. It was a very effective scare campaign and made life pretty miserable for a lot of NJ residents (especially in Sapporo). Pity no hooligans showed up. But say “Open Sesame” with any hint of foreign danger, and police budgets get soaked with more public cash. People get stupid when motivated by fear. The NPA knows that, and now that next year’s budgets are being debated, its the perfect time to make house calls on the Finance Ministry. It’s a virtuous circle as long as you’re not a foreigner or a taxpayer.

As a friend pointed out, the hard-core American and European protestors wouldn’t really bother coming to Japan. It’s too far and too expensive, and too alien in language and cultural values for them to find much in the way of support from local Japanese before they come or after they arrive. And even fewer of them really care what Japan says or does in G-8. The sense is that, like a growing number of people elsewhere, they see Japan as a fading regional power that the world is listening to less and less. And if anything, this is probably more a way to please ascendant China in its Olympic Year–keep out Falun Gong and Free Tibet types in this very carefully-controlled media event.

Why does Japan even bother to hold any international events if they’re just going to put the J public through another fear campaign? I shudder to think what would happen if Tokyo actually does succeed in its bid to get another Olympics…

Arudou Debito in Sapporo

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Govt to keep ‘hooligans’ away from G-8 summit
The Yomiuri Shimbun Dec. 31, 2007
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20071231TDY01301.htm
Courtesy of Jeff Korpa

The Justice Ministry has begun preparations to put into force a hooligan provision of the immigration law to prevent antiglobalization activists from entering the country to protest the Group of Eight summit meeting to be held in Hokkaido in July.

Relevant ministries and agencies will discuss criteria for defining antiglobalization activists, to whom the provision will be applied for the first time, and seek additional information from other countries.

The hooligan provision was added when the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Law was revised in 2001 and enforced in 2002 to keep hooligans out of the country for the 2002 World Cup soccer finals.

The provision states immigration authorities can refuse entry to people who have injured, assaulted, threatened or killed people or damaged buildings to disrupt international sports events or meetings.

It also disallows entry to people who have been imprisoned in Japan or other countries or have been deported before if immigration officials believe they might be involved in similar actions again.

Under the provision, 19 hooligans were prohibited from entering the country in 2002. The provision has not been applied in other cases.

Unions and environmental protection groups have often been involved in protests against economic globalization, which activists assert has widened the gaps between rich and poor and harmed the environment.

(Dec. 31, 2007)
ENDS

Patricia Aliperti & Catherine Makino on NJ Sexual Slavery/Human Trafficking in Japan

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Here is a situation covered only infrequently by the media and by the likes of Debito.org (mainly because there is so little public information out there, and it’s a topic I’m not at liberty to research myself)–how sex trafficking, particularly that involving non-Japanese, is a flourishing business. And how Japan is one of the world’s major trading posts for it.

I’ve dealt with issues of slavery before (to this day, it exists in just about every country on the planet), but Japan’s has always had a wink-wink attitude towards the water trades–even by Prime Ministers regarding Japan’s historical connections–and especially when it comes to its particularly nasty variant involving foreigners. NJ “entertainers” (there was even an official visa category for it) are in a much weaker position linguistically (language barrier), economically (in more desperate straits) and legally (NJ have visas, meaning bosses can use denial of visa status as a further means for forcing compliance). This means it took gaiatsu (i.e. an unfavorable report from the US State Department) before the GOJ actually did anything meaningful about it.

Older article from Catherine Makino follows. And if you hope or think the situation has improved, check out this incredible Powerpoint presentation by Ms. Patricia Aliperti, Rotary World Peace Fellow at the International Christian University in Tokyo, which she gave me after a speech I attended at the Peace as a Global Language Conference in Kyoto last October 27:

https://www.debito.org/HumanTraffickingShortPresentation.ppt

Breathtaking in its breadth and depth, it will open your eyes to the issue. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Japan Installs Caution Signal for Sex Traffic
Run Date: 07/18/05
By Catherine Makino WeNews correspondent
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/2378/context/archive
Courtesy of Aly Rustom

Japan has revised its criminal law to stipulate human trafficking as a crime and punish those involved. Activists, however, remain alarmed by foreign-staffed sex parlors that have made the country a haven for traffickers.

TOKYO (WOMENSENEWS)–There are about 10,000 parlors in Japan that offer sex to patrons.

Many advertise that they have foreign women by using such names as Filipina Pub, Russian Bar or Thai Delight. The patrons pay $60 to $100 for drinks and then an additional $150 to $300 to take women out of the bar to have sex with them.

Most of these women come to Japan on falsified passports or with entertainer or short-term visas, says Hidenori Sakanaka, who until a year ago was the director of the Tokyo Immigration Bureau. They are told that they have to pay off fake debts and their passports often are taken away upon arrival in Japan. The women are beaten and controlled by threats to family members in their home countries.

“Most women are moved from place to place and are too scared to complain,” Sakanaka says.

Sakanaka, who now directs the Japan Aid Association for North Korean Returnees, is credited with pushing through revisions to the law to combat trafficking while in his former post. Passed by the National Diet last month, it has helped abate international concerns about a country that has long been criticized for a too-tolerant an approach to trafficking.

On Saturday, the National Police Agency said police had uncovered 29 cases of human trafficking of foreign women from January to the end of June, up by five from the same period last year.

Despite these and other promising moves by Japan–brought about in part by the activism of Japanese women’s groups–international and local advocates continue to worry about the country’s problem with human trafficking, the world’s third-largest underworld business after trade in drugs and arms, netting $9.5 billion annually.

In a recent report the Japan Network against Trafficking in Persons said that the government’s heightened anti-trafficking efforts had so far not “made a dent.”

Fact-Finding Mission Last Week

Last week, Sigma Huda, the special rapporteur on trafficking for the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, came here on an unofficial fact-finding mission with activists, lawyers, lawmakers, academics and others concerned about human trafficking. The visit followed widespread reports–including by Amnesty International Japan–of South Asian women from developing nations being trafficked in this highly developed country.

“It’s the dark side of globalization,” says Huda, who is based in Bangladesh.

Reports indicate that about 130,000 women come to Japan on entertainer visas every year, but only about 10 percent of them actually perform in legitimate shows at hotels and other venues. Many obtain entertainment visas through agents who recruit them to Japan with promises of jobs that don’t exist.

Sakanaka traces the problem to immigration officials who bend to politicians and businessmen who hire foreign women for illicit purposes. “Some men even said I was out of my mind to try to do something about human trafficking,” he says. “They claimed it was part of Japanese culture to have sex with foreign women. They were addicted to the parlors. I received phone calls from politicians and anonymous threats on my life.”

Japan Kept Off Worst-Trafficker List

Earlier this month, the U.S. State department removed Japan from a special watch list of countries that were to be included on an updated listed as the worst condoners of human trafficking after the Japanese government compiled an action program to combat human traffickers. The State Department had put Japan on that list a year ago.

Under the new Japanese legislation, those who “purchase” people in order to control their activities will face punishment of up to five years in prison. The maximum punishment could be increased to seven years imprisonment if the victim is a minor.

The new legislation will also grant victims, on a case-by-case basis, special residency status even if they have overstayed their original visa, so that they can be rehabilitated.

Before these revisions, police dealt with trafficking by arresting the victims as illegal aliens, jailing them and deporting them as soon as they had enough money to fly home. Traffickers received a fine or a short jail sentence.

One of the most notorious traffickers, Koichi Hagiwara, known as Sony for his habit of videotaping his victims while he humiliated and tortured them, was sentenced in March 2003 and served less than two years in prison for violating labor laws.

Japanese Women Enraged

Japanese women have also pressured the government to do something about human trafficking.

“Many women were enraged by an article in the Asahi Shimbun, a major daily newspaper in Japan, about the practice,” says Sakanaka, the former director of the Immigration Bureau, referring to an investigative article published Oct. 18, 2003. “Until this article came out, Japanese women knew little about the situation. Women’s groups mobilized, and called up magazines and newspapers to protest the treatment of the women victims.”

The government, Sakanaka says, has neglected to investigate many of the abuse cases. These women, he says, live horrific, lonely lives, forced into having unprotected sex and perform other risky acts with dozens of customers a day. “These new laws are valuable. But they also need to strike at the center of organized crime.”

Sakanaka is concerned that most foreign women will be too scared to go to the police because they think they will be killed if they try to escape.

Chieko Tatsumi, an official in the International Organized Crime Division of Japan’s Foreign Ministry, disagrees. She believes the victims would seek protection from the police.

“There has already been an increase in the number of women asking for protection,” Tatsumi says. “In 2002, there were only two Thais who sought help, but in 2004 there were 25.”

She says that the government set a budget of $100,000 in April for helping women who come to a public shelter.

“The government will pay for rehabilitation for the victims of sexual enslavement and tickets for them to return to their home countries,” Tatsumi says. Not enough, says Sono[ko] Kawakami, campaign manager for Victims of Violence of Japan Amnesty International. The government’s measures fail to sufficiently protect victims and the amount of money budgeted to stop trafficking is insufficient, she says.

Her organization wants separate facilities for trafficking victims, rather than housing them with victims of domestic violence. Many victims are so traumatized that they won’t talk to anyone, so they require specialists to handle them, Kawakami says. Since many do not speak Japanese she also wants language translation support for the victims and specialists in human trafficking to assist them.

Although she believes the government can do more, she says the revisions to the criminal law affecting trafficking are a good start.
Keiko Otsu, director of Asian Women’s Shelter in Tokyo, is also pleased with the new laws, but says there are currently only two shelters available for these women.

“The women don’t have any income, assistance or support,” she says. “Some may be pregnant and many have mental and other health problems, including AIDs and other sexually transmitted diseases and need expensive medial care.”

Catherine Makino is a freelance writer in Tokyo. She has written for San Francisco Chronicle, the Japan Times, The Asian Wall Street Journal and the China Morning Post.

For more information:

Japan Network Against Trafficking in Persons:
http://jnatip.blogspot.com
International Organization for Migration:
http://www.iom.int/
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Gyaku on upcoming GOJ regulations of the Internet: Online content, keitai, and file sharing

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Happy New Year, everyone. Let’s kick off the new year with a post on our future as bloggers here: Internet info site Gyaku on Japan’s future regulation of the Internet.

My minor comment at this point is that I have mixed feelings about regulation–in that I know from personal experience there is no mechanism in place for regulating libel. I won a case in court exactly two years ago against the world’s largest BBS system, 2-Channel, for libel and defamation (where an anonymous poster said things I never said about the Iraq War etc.–see information site here). 2-Channel not only refused to either delete the comments or reveal the IP of the anonymous poster(s), but also administrators refused to answer any correspondence, appear in court, or pay court-ordered damages. Despite the same thing happening to dozens of other plaintiffs, all resulting in defeat for 2-Channel, there have been no arrests, and no progress whatsoever; you can still Google the libelous comments against me today and get more than 800 hits. Clearly something has to be done about this.

There are, of course, two issues which call for reform. One is a business registry issue–where there is no way to seize the assets of anonymous Internet “media sources” (the normal way of regulating the media when they say things that are untrue and damaging). The other is a Japanese judiciary issue–there is no Contempt of Court in Japan (which would change a Civil Suit into a Criminal Suit and cause 2-Channel administrators to be arrestable). But once you get the ball rolling on this issue, you never know what’s going to happen, when the actions of the GOJ are done in such secrecy and (ironically) with insufficient media scrutiny. And moderate reforms have a habit of becoming major–as the letter of the law is often left vague, and once enacted the GOJ appends “bureaucratic directives” to give enforcers more powers after the fact. 2-Channel, you’ve brought things like this upon all of us. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

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Regulating the Japanese cyberspace, one step at a time
Thursday, December 27, 2007
by shioyama
http://gyaku.jp/en/index.php?cmd=contentview&pid=000320
Courtesy DJD and JBB

With little fanfare from local or foreign media, the Japanese government made major moves this month toward legislating extensive regulation over online communication and information exchange within its national borders. In a series of little-publicized meetings attracting minimal mainstream coverage, two distinct government ministries, that of Internal Affairs and Communications (Somusho) and that of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Monbukagakusho), pushed ahead with regulation in three major areas of online communication: web content, mobile phone access, and file sharing.

On December 6th, in a final report compiled by a study group under the Somusho following up on an interim report drafted earlier this year, the government set down plans to regulate online content through unification of existing laws such as the Broadcast Law and the Telecommunications Business Law [1,2]. The planned regulation targets all web content, including online variants of traditional media such as newspaper articles and television broadcasting, while additionally going as far as to cover user-generated content such as blogs and webpages under the vaguely-defined category of “open communication” [3,4,5,6].

Only days following the release of the Dec. 6 report, again through the Somusho, the government on Dec. 10th requested that mobile phone companies NTT Docomo, KDDI, Softbank and Willcom commence strictly filtering web content to mobile phones for users under the age of 18 [7,8,9,10]. The move to filter content in this area comes at a time when the Japanese market has become saturated with mobile phones, a growing proportion of which are held by high-school and even grade-school students. The proposed policy, in part responding to fears and anxieties expressed by parents about online dating sites, is broad in scope and reportedly covers all websites with forum, chat, and social networking functionality.

Regulation of a third area of online communication, that of online file sharing, was meanwhile advanced through the Private Music and Video Recording Subcommittee of Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs (under the Mobukagakusho) in a meeting held on December 18th. Authorities and organizations pushed in this case for a ban on the download of copyrighted content for personal use, a category of file transfer previously permitted under Article 30 of Japan’s Copyright Law [11,12,13,14].

The final report on Internet regulation released on December 6th, and the meetings about mobile phone regulation and copyright policy held on December 10th and 18th, collectively touch on nearly every aspect of modern network communication in Japan and together indicate a significant shift in government policy vis-a-vis the Japanese cyberspace. While granted little attention in mainstream media, a series of Japanese-language articles, government reports, and blog entries on the topic together sketch basic details of the proposed regulations. The main points of these documents are summarized below, with references to resources offering more in-depth discussion included at the end of the article.

Step 1: Web content

Plans for regulation of web content are summarized in two primary documents drawn up by the “Study group on the legal system for communications and broadcasting” under the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (Somusho) and headed by Professor Emeritus at Hitotsubashi University Horibe Masao. The first document is an interim report released on June 19th, setting down basic guidelines for regulating web content through application of the existing Broadcast Law to the sphere of the Internet [1,4]. Incorporating the views of a reported 276 comments from 222 individuals and 56 organizations collected shortly after publication of the interim report, the final report, made public on December 6th, sets down steps to move ahead and submit a bill on the proposed regulations to the regular diet session in 2010 [2,5,6].

One of the key points of both reports is their emphasis on the blurring line between “information transmission” and “broadcasting”, a distinction that becomes less and less meaningful as content-transfer shifts from the realm of traditional media to that of ubiquitous digital communication (so-called “all over IP”). The reports deal with this difficult problem in part through the creation of a new category, that of “open communication”, broadly described as covering “communication content having openness [kouzensei/公然性] such as homepages and so on” [3].

The term “open communication” may itself be vaguely defined, but implications of the new category are in fact very real. While previously largely excluded from government regulation thanks to the limited scope of existing broadcast legislation, all online content, with the exception only of private messages used only between specific persons (i.e. email, etc.), will henceforth be targeted under the proposed policy. Notably included in this category are hugely popular bulletin board systems such as 2channel as well as personal blogs and webpages.

Online content judged to be “harmful” according to standards set down by an independent body (specifics of which are unclear) will be subject to law-enforced removal and/or correction. While the interim report did not specify whether penal regulations would be enforced against policy violations, the final report, in response to concerns voiced in public comments over the summer, moved toward excluding such regulations for the time being at least. Nonetheless, the final report also notes that, if there is a need for it, the “adequacy of punishment should also be investigated” (page 22 of the final report) [5]. It thus remains an open question as to whether, if eventually enacted, penal regulations will be applied and, if so, what form they will take.

Step 2: Mobile phone access

As the number of elementary and high-school students with mobile phones in Japan has ballooned to over 7.5 million, the push for protecting young users from potentially dangerous content, such as online dating services and so-called “mobile filth”, has gained momentum in recent years within Japan. The government responded to such concerns on December 10th by demanding that mobile carriers NTT Docomo, KDDI, Softbank, and Willcom implement filtering on all mobile phones issued to users under the age of 18. While optional filtering currently exists and can be implemented at the request of the mobile phone owner, few users make use of or even know of this service. The proposed regulation would heavily strengthen earlier policy by making filtering on mobile phones the default setting for minors; only in the case of an explicit request by the user’s parent or guardian could such filtering be turned off by the carrier [7,8,9].

According to the new policy proposal, sites would be categorized on two lists, a “blacklist” of sites that would be blocked from mobile access by minors and a “whitelist” of sites that would not. The categorization of sites into each list will reportedly be carried out together with carriers through investigations involving each company targeted. The Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) of Japan is indicating that the new policy will be enforced with respect to new users by the end of 2007 and applied to existing users by the summer of 2008 [8].

While it is not yet entirely clear what content will be covered by the new policy, a look at existing filtering services promoted by NTT Docomo reveals the definition of “harmful” content to be very broad indeed. As noted by a number of Japanese bloggers, notably social activist Sakiyama Nobuo, current optional filtering services offered on NTT Docomo phones include categories as sweeping as “lifestyles” (gay, lesbian, etc.), “religion”, and “political activity/party”, as well as a category termed “communication” covering web forums, chat rooms, bulletin boards, and social networking services. The breadth of this last category in particular threatens to bankrupt youth-oriented services such as “Mobage”, a social networking and gaming site for mobile phones, half of whose users are under the age of 18.

Step 3: File sharing

While the cases of Internet regulation and mobile phone filtering primarily revolve on concerns over content, the third government policy proposal advanced this month in the domain of online communication targets the area of content transfer. On December 18th, the Private Music and Video Recording Subcommittee of Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs, an advisory body under the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (Monbukagakusho), held a meeting to re-examine Article 30 of Japan’s Copyright Law. With respect to online file transfer, the existing law currently bans uploading of copyrighted material onto public websites, while permitting copies for personal use only [12,13,14].

At the December 18th meeting, Kawase Makoto, general manager of the agency’s Copyrighted Work Circulation Promotion Department, remarked that revising article 30 was “inevitable” [11]. Kawase’s comment came less than a month after the same agency received more than 7500 public comments on the topic of the plans, the majority of which reportedly opposed any change to the current Copyright Law [15,16,17]. Haeno Hidetoshi , senior director of the Recording Industry Association of Japan, meanwhile described the state of the recording industry as “spine-chilling”, arguing that if illegal file sharing was not stopped the business would hit a dead end [12].

IT and music journalist Tsuda Daisuke on the other hand argued that he did not see any need for legal revision, observing that if users uploading copyrighted files are controlled, then there should be no need to outlaw illegal downloads or file sharing. In an earlier Nov. 28th meeting, addressing the divide in opions among public comments about the regulation, Tsuda noted that results evidenced a “deep gap” between the views of copyright holders and those of consumers. He further warned that to ignore the views of those opposing revision, and to not attempt to understand their arguments, would be to invite further deepening of this gap [16,17].

One of the key issues raised by opponents of the proposed revisions regards the murky definition of “download” itself. Critics argue that a user cannot determine whether a file is illegal before they actually download it, and even once the file is downloaded, such identification remains difficult. Moreover, it is difficult for users to judge whether, at the time of downloading a file, the site from which the file was downloaded was itself illegal or not. While proponents of the legal revision have argued in favour of a “mark” to identify approved sites, this approach brings with it many new problems; most critically, it would mean that every site not bearing the approved mark would be considered “illegal”, a blanket policy many consider extreme [17].

The murkiness of the definition of “illegal” file sharing also manifests itself in the difficulties legislators will potentially face in distinguishing between “downloading” and “streaming”, difficulties which some argue may ultimately lead to the regulation of sites such as YouTube and Nico Nico Douga. As there is no fundamental difference between downloaded content and streamed content, given that in both cases content is copied locally before viewing, commenters expressed anxiety about how judges with no specialized knowledge will handle this murky middle ground.

The future of “open”

The various problems evident in the regulation policies described above are compacted by the fact that there is a lack of coordination between branches of government, the first two proposals being handled by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications while the last is being handled by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. Without a coordinated approach to regulation, legal conflicts inherent in the switch to “all over IP” are guaranteed to arise.

Even with such a coordinated approach, however, policy remains ill-defined and extremely vague. The future of online communication within Japan hinges on attracting attention to these issues and on drawing as wide a range of voices into the debate as possible. While current activism by groups within Japan such as the recently formed Movements for Internet Active Users (MIAU) have made important first steps in this direction, international attention is needed to coordinate support and confront the many pressing issues facing open communication in the Japanese cyberspace.

References

1. “Interim report of the Study group on the legal system for communications and broadcasting” (通信・放送の総合的な法体系に関する研究会 中間取りまとめ), June 19, 2007. link.
2. “Final report of the Study group on the legal system for communications and broadcasting” (通信・放送の総合的な法体系に関する研究会 報告書), December 6, 2007. link.
3. “Blogs and 2channel also subject to Telecommunications Law (tentative title)” (ブログ、2chも対象にする「情報通信法」（仮）とは), atmarkIT, June 20, 2007. link
4. “Internet regulation up for debate, but nobody is debating,” Global Voices Online, June 12, 2007. link
5. “Final Report on Internet Regulation,” Global Voices Online, December 16, 2007. link
6. “Japan to take steps to regulate the Internet,” Mainichi shimbun, December 6, 2007. link
7. “Request to mobile phone carriers regarding the introduction of services for restricting access to harmful sites from mobile phones and personal headsets used by young people” (filtering service) (青少年が使用する携帯電話・ＰＨＳにおける有害サイトアクセス制限サービス（フィルタリングサービス）の導入促進に関する携帯電話事業者等への要請), Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, December 10, 2007. link
8. “Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications to make use of filtering function on mobile phones and personal headsets in general mandatory for youth” (総務省、青少年の携帯・PHS利用でフィルタリング機能を原則義務化), December 10th, 2007. link
9. “Protect kids from crime: Mobile phone filtering, strengthening countermeasures for children” (子どもを犯罪から守れ – 携帯サイトのフィルタリング、子ども向け対策強化), MyCom Journal, December 12, 2007. link
10. “New cell phone rules eyed to protect kids,” Yomiuri Shimbun, Nov. 25, 2007. link
11. “Head of the Copyrighted Work Circulation Promotion Department of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology indicates view that outlawing of illegal downloads is ‘unavoidable'” (ダウンロード違法化は「やむを得ない」、文化庁著作権課が見解示す), Internet Watch, December 18, 2007. link
12. Takeyoshi Yamada, “Final Blow to File Sharing? Japan’s Gov’t to Revise Copyright Law,” TechOn, December 19, 2007. link
13. “Economics of the ‘Illegal’ Download,” Global Voices Online, December 23, 2007. link
14. “Japanese Panel Pushes Ban on Illegal Downloads Forward,” Anime News Network, December 20, 2007. link
15. “The why of the ‘outlawing of downloads’ despite a great number of opposing views” (反対意見多数でも「ダウンロード違法化」のなぜ), IT Media, December 18, 2007. link
16. “7500 comments collected regarding illegal download legislation, Private Music and Video Recording Subcommittee” (ダウンロード違法化などに7,500件の意見集まる、私的録音録画小委員会), November 28, 2007. link
17. “Opposing views against ‘outlawing illegal downloads’, but … the gap between ‘copyright holders’ and ‘users'” (「ダウンロード違法化」に反対意見集まるが……　埋まらぬ「権利者」vs.「ユーザー」の溝), IT Media, November 28, 2007. link

Article title translations by gyaku.
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GOJ now worried about aliens. No, not foreigners.

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. It must be Christmas or New Year Holiday craziness (I too intend to limit myself to one blog entry per day, off the beaten track from the usual fare on Debito.org)–but get a load of this:

==================================
Japan’s defence minister braces for aliens
AFP Dec 19, 2007
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hHGF47XsVoM_97L8olNf_j3b1MBA
Courtesy Monty DiPietro

TOKYO (AFP) — As Japan takes a more active role in military affairs, the defence minister has more on his mind than just threats here on Earth.

Shigeru Ishiba became the second member of the cabinet to profess a belief in UFOs and said he was looking at how Japan’s military could respond to aliens under the pacifist constitution.

“There are no grounds for us to deny that there are unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and some life-form that controls them,” Ishiba told reporters, saying it was his personal view and not that of the defence ministry.

Ishiba, nicknamed a “security geek” for his wonkish knowledge of defence affairs, noted that Japan deployed its military against Godzilla in the classic monster movie.

“Few discussions have been made on what the legal grounds were for that,” the minister said with a slight grin, drawing laughter from reporters.

Due to the US-imposed 1947 constitution, Japan’s de facto military is known as the Self-Defence Forces and has never fired a shot in combat since World War II.

But Japan has gradually sought a greater global military role, sending troops to support US-led operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Ishiba said he was examining different scenarios for an alien invasion.

“If they descended, saying ‘People of the Earth, let’s make friends,’ it would not be considered an urgent, unjust attack on our country,” Ishiba said.

“And there is another issue of how can we convey our intentions if we don’t understand what they are saying,” he said.

“We should consider various possibilities,” he said. “There is no need at all to do this as the defence ministry, but I want to consider what to do by myself.”

Ishiba’s remarks came after the government this week said it had no knowledge of UFOs, prompting a surprise rebuttal from the top government spokesman.

“Personally, I absolutely believe they exist,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said on Tuesday.
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==============================
Japanese Minister O.K.’s Fighting Godzilla
By MARTIN FACKLER The New York Times: December 21, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/21/world/asia/22japan-briefs.html?_r=1&ref=world&oref=slogin

TOKYO — Japan’s defense minister stirred a minor media squall after joking with reporters about possible invasions by space aliens and movie monsters during a regular news conference.

Responding to a question, Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba told reporters on Thursday that he was studying whether the nation’s pacifist Constitution would limit a military response to an attack by space aliens.

“There are no grounds to deny that there are unidentified flying objects and some life-forms that control them,” Mr. Ishiba said, smiling at first, but then launching into a straight-faced explanation. “If Godzilla attacked, that would probably be a natural disaster relief operation,” making military action legally permissible, he said.

But the legal grounds for mobilizing militarily against a U.F.O. would be less clear unless the aliens attacked first, he said.

The comments drew widespread disbelief here, coming after verbal gaffes that helped sink the previous prime minister’s administration, and days after the chief cabinet secretary, who is the government’s top spokesman, professed a belief in U.F.O.’s.
==============================
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COMMENT: No mention if Godzilla or E.T. would be fingerprinted upon entry. Or whether E.T.’s “ouch” finger would fit properly into the biometric machinery.

An off-the-cuff remark here or there, okay. But this discussion has gone on too long and taken too much media and time from real govt. business. And these representatives of the world’s second biggest economy still want to be taken seriously? Are there not more important things to discuss, such as the ongoing Nenkin debacle? I told you in my most recent Japan Times essay that Japan’s legislative peerage was out of touch with reality. They lining up to prove it?

Somebody call a snap election and get these fools out. Arudou Debito in Sapporo
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Japan Times: My Dec 18 Zeit Gist column on premeditated xenophobia in Japan

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hello Blog. Here’s the last Japan Times column I’ll do this year–and it’s a doozy. I’m very happy with how it came out, and judging by the feedback I’ve gotten others are too.

It’s about how Japan’s xenophobia is in fact by public policy design, due to unchallenged policymakers and peerage politicians, and how it’s actually hurting our country. Have a read if you haven’t already.

Best wishes for the holiday season, Arudou Debito in Sapporo, Japan

=====================================

“THE MYOPIC STATE WE’RE IN”

Fingerprint scheme exposes xenophobic, short-sighted trend in government

By ARUDOU DEBITO

THE JAPAN TIMES COMMUNITY PAGE

Column 42 for The Zeit Gist, Tuesday, Dec. 18, 2007

“Director’s Cut” of the article with links to sources at

https://www.debito.org/japantimes121807.html

Excellent illustration by Chris MacKenzie at the Japan Times website at

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20071218zg.html

We all notice it eventually: how nice individual Japanese people are, yet how cold — even discriminatory — officialdom is toward non-Japanese (NJ). This dichotomy is often passed off as something “cultural” (a category people tend to assign anything they can’t understand), but recent events have demonstrated there is in fact a grand design. This design is visible in government policies and public rhetoric, hard-wiring the public into fearing and blaming foreigners.

Start with the “us” and “them” binary language of official government pronouncements: how “our country” (“wagakuni”) must develop policy for the sake of our “citizens” (“kokumin”) toward foreign “visitors” (rarely “residents”); how foreigners bring discrimination upon themselves, what with their “different languages, religions, and lifestyle customs” an’ all; and how everyone has inalienable human rights in Japan — except the aliens.

The atmosphere wasn’t always so hostile. During the bubble economy of the late ’80s and its aftermath, the official mantra was “kokusaika” (internationalization), where NJ were given leeway as misunderstood outsiders.

But in 2000, kicked off by Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara’s “sangokujin” speech — in which he called on the Self-Defense Forces to round up foreigners during natural disasters in case they riot — the general attitude shifted perceptibly from benign neglect to downright antipathy….

==============

REST AT

https://www.debito.org/japantimes121807.html

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20071218zg.html

ENDS

Yomiuri: GOJ to forbid employers from confiscating NJ passports

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Here’s some good news.

After much trouble with employers confiscating NJ worker passports (ostensible reasons given in the article, but much of the time it led to abuses, even slavery, with the passport retained as a Sword of Damocles to elicit compliance from workers), the GOJ looks like it will finally make the practice expressly illegal.

About time–a passport is the property of the issuing government, and not something a foreign government (or another person) can impound indefinitely. The fact that it’s been used as a weapon to keep the foreign Trainee laborer in line for nearly two decades speaks volumes about the GOJ’s will to protect people’s rights once they get here.

Glad this is finally coming on the books. Now let’s hope it gets enforced. Referential articles follow Yomiuri article:

========================

Govt guidelines to forbid firms to keep foreign trainees’ passports
The Yomiuri Shimbun, Dec 18, 2007
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20071218TDY01307.htm
Courtesy Jeff Korpa and Mark Schreiber

The Justice Ministry looks set to stop companies that accept foreign trainees from confiscating trainees’ passports and foreign registration certificates, ministry sources said Monday.

The toughened ministry guidelines for host companies also state that preventing foreign trainees from traveling wherever they wish to go when they are off duty is unacceptable. Firms have been curtailing the movement of workers and holding on to passports and certificates to prevent such trainees from disappearing.

The ministry will likely release the guidelines this week and will notify organizations, including commerce and industry associations, that accept foreign trainees of the new rules.

The foreign trainee system was designed to enhance international relations by introducing foreign trainees to new technology and skills, but it often has been misused as an excuse to bring unskilled workers into the country.

Commerce and industry associations and organizations of small and midsize companies accept foreign trainees, who are introduced to companies to learn skills for up to three years.

Under the current system, foreign trainees receive one year of training followed by two years as on-the-job trainees. As the training year is not considered employment, such workers are not protected by the Labor Standards Law.

The new guidelines for the entry and stay management of foreign trainees are a revised version of the 1999 guidelines.

The new guidelines prohibit host companies from using improper methods to manage foreign trainees, such as holding their passports, and foreign nationals from being accepted through brokering organizations other than via authorized organizations

Also banned are misleading advertisements for the recruitment of host companies, such as those that say foreign trainees can be used to resolve a labor shortage.

The tougher regulations are aimed at preventing commerce and industry associations from becoming nominal organizations for accepting foreign trainees. This practice has seen brokering organizations exploit foreign trainees by introducing them to companies.

To prevent overseas dispatch organizations from exploiting foreign trainees, the new guidelines also include a measure that requires host companies to refuse to accept foreign trainees in the event a foreign dispatch organization is found to have asked them to pay a large deposit. The guidelines have been revised for the first time in eight years because companies that do not not qualify to take on foreign trainees have been taking a rapidly increasing number of such workers.
==========================
ARTICLE ENDS

REFERENTIAL ARTICLES:
Japan scheme ‘abuses foreign workers’
By Chris Hogg BBC News, Tokyo, Wednesday, 3 October 2007
https://www.debito.org/?p=681

EXPLOITING VIETNAMESE Apocalypse now
Japan Times Sunday, April 29, 2007 By MARK SCHREIBER Shukan Kinyobi (April 20)
https://www.debito.org/?p=619

POINT OF VIEW/ Hiroshi Tanaka: Japan must open its arms to foreign workers
07/03/2007 THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
https://www.debito.org/?p=478

Nearly 10,000 foreigners disappear from job training sites in Japan 2002-2006
JAPAN TODAY.COM/KYODO NEWS Monday, July 2, 2007
https://www.debito.org/?p=475

Govt split over foreign trainee program
Yomiuri Shimbun May 19, 2007
https://www.debito.org/?p=435
For starters…
Arudou Debito in Sapporo
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読売：パスポート預かり禁止…外国人研修生の保護強化

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

パスポート預かり禁止…外国人研修生の保護強化
2007年12月18日 読売新聞
Courtesy of Tony Keyes and Mark Schreiber
http://job.yomiuri.co.jp/news/jo_ne_07121802.cfm

　外国人研修・技能実習制度が、安価な労働力として外国人を雇用する隠れみのとして使われていると指摘される問題で、法務省は１７日、受け入れ企業などを対象とした同制度に関する新たな運用指針をまとめた。

　研修生の失踪（しっそう）防止のために外出を禁止したり、たとえ本人の同意があっても企業が旅券（パスポート）や外国人登録証を預かったりする行為を、違反すれば３年間、研修生の受け入れができなくなる「不正行為」にあたると明記するなど、研修生を保護するための規定を厳格化したのが特徴だ。同省は今週内にも新指針を公表し、商工会などの受け入れ機関に通知する。

　同制度は日本の技術・技能を海外に伝えることが目的で、海外から研修生を商工会や中小企業団体などが受け入れ、商工会などが紹介した企業で実務研修や技能実習を最長３年間行う。

　今回まとめられた「研修生及び技能実習生の入国・在留管理に関する指針」は１９９９年に策定された指針の改定版。企業などに対し、旅券を預かるなどの「不適正な方法による管理」を禁止したほか、商工会などに対する禁止事項として〈１〉正式な受け入れ機関以外が介在し、研修を行うこと〈２〉「労働力不足の解消」などの広告により実務研修を行う企業を募集すること――などを挙げた。商工会などが名目的に受け入れ機関となり、実際はブローカーが外国人研修生を企業に紹介し中間搾取することを防ぐ目的がある。

　一方、国内の受け入れ先だけでなく、海外の研修生派遣機関の不正行為を防ぐため「派遣機関が研修生から高額な保証金を徴収したことが判明した場合は、受け入れ機関は受け入れを取りやめる対応をとる」ことも盛り込んだ。

（2007年12月18日 読売新聞）
ENDS

Mainichi Poll: 63% of Japanese favor immigration of unskilled foreign laborers

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. I had a column in the Japan Times today talking about the mysterious perception gap between friendly, welcoming Japanese people, and a government which is expressly xenophobic and increasingly antipathetic towards foreigners. As further fodder for that claim, look at this interesting poll, where the majority of people aren’t falling for the media- and GOJ-manufactured fear of the outside world or the alien within. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

=============================
63% of Japanese favor allowing immigration of unskilled foreign laborers
（Mainichi Japan） December 17, 2007
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/national/archive/news/2007/12/17/20071217p2a00m0na038000c.html

More than 60 percent of people in Japan support accepting entry-level workers from overseas, in spite of the government’s policy of generally refusing such workers, a survey by the Mainichi has found.

In a nationwide telephone poll conducted by the Mainichi, 63 percent of respondents agreed with accepting foreign entry-level workers. Another 31 percent were against the idea, citing reasons such as that it would have a negative effect on Japanese employment or public peace.

A special employment plan approved by the Cabinet in June 1988 agreed to actively accept specialist and skilled foreign workers, but to take a “cautious” approach with regard to entry-level workers, and as a result, foreign unskilled laborers are generally refused entry to Japan.

When questioned about the government’s policy, 58 percent of respondents in the survey agreed with accepting unskilled foreign workers in fields where there was a lack of workers. Five percent said entry-level foreign workers should be accepted unconditionally.

When the 31 percent of respondents who said that such workers should not be accepted were asked to give a reason for their stance, 51 percent replied that it would have a negative effect on the employment and working environments of Japanese nationals. Another 35 percent said that public security would worsen, while 10 percent said trouble would occur as a result of differences between customs. Three percent cited an increased burden in areas such as social security costs and education costs.

When asked who would cover social security and education costs, the answers “the businesses employing the workers” and “industries that need workers” each received 38 percent. The answers “foreign workers themselves,” and “the whole public” each marked only 11 percent.

Hidenori Sakanaka, head of the Japan Immigration Policy Institute, who formerly served as a director of the Tokyo Regional Immigration Bureau, said Japan’s entry into an age with a dwindling population was behind the rising acceptance of allowing entry-level workers into Japan.

“Another reason is probably that the relationship with foreigners in Japan has taken a turn for the better,” he said. Sakanaka added that the work done by entry-level workers, such as nursing and work in the agriculture, forestry and fisheries industry, required specialist knowledge and skills, as well as the ability to adapt to Japanese society, and was certainly not simple. He added that a system to accept foreigners under a policy of cultivating human resources was urgently needed.
（Mainichi Japan） December 17, 2007
ENDS

UN News: UNHCR dismayed by secret death penalty of J convicts

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. This is tangental to Debito.org, as it involves issues of the death penalty, not internationalization and multiculturalization. But it’s yet another example of Japan not following treaties. Do read to the very end, and goggle at a comment from Justice Minister Hatoyama…

//////////////////////////////////

TOP UN HUMAN RIGHTS OFFICIAL DISMAYED BY EXECUTION OF THREE JAPANESE PRISONERS
UN News.org. New York, Dec 7 2007 7:00PM
Courtesy UNNews AT un.org

The top United Nations human rights official today deplored the execution of three prisoners – including one aged over 75 – in Osaka, Japan, and appealed to the East Asian nation to reassess its approach to the death penalty.

The executions reportedly took place suddenly and neither the convicts nor their families were given advance warning.

“This practice is problematic under international law, and I call on Japan to reconsider its approach in this regard,” Louise Arbour, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, said.

Expressing particularly dismay at the execution of the prisoner over the age of 75, she said that “it is difficult to see what legitimate purpose is served by carrying out such executions of the elderly, and at the very least on humanitarian grounds, I would urge Japan to refrain from such action.”

In contrast to carrying out executions in secret as it has done in the past, Japan publicly released the names of those executed, the High Commissioner noted.

Japan is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which legally obligates States Parties to ensure strict safeguards when applying the death penalty. It is widely accepted that executions cannot be carried out in secret and without warning, as this could be seen as inhuman punishment and treatment under the ICCPR.

Ms. Arbour urged the Japanese Government to implement a moratorium on executions or ban the practice altogether, as a growing number of nations have.
2007-12-07 00:00:00.000
ENDS

//////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: And this is where our Justice Minister, Hatoyama “al-Qaeda” Kunio, was referring to about the higher value put on life in Japan than in the West? I included this in an earlier Newsletter, but it bears repeating:

========================================
Interview with Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama
Shuukan Asahi, October 26, 2007 P.122.
Title: “The Reason I will carry out Executions.”
Partial translation by Michael H. Fox, Director, Japan Death Penalty Information Center
http://www.jdpic.org

Q: There is a big trend to abolish the death penalty worldwide. Why do you want to keep it in Japan?

HATOYAMA: The Japanese place so much importance on the value of life, so it is thought that one should pay with one’s life after taking the life of another. You see, the Western nations are civilizations based on power and war. So, conversely, things are moving against the death penalty. This is an important point to understand. The so called civilizations of power and war are opposite (from us). From incipient stages, their conception of the value of life is weaker than the Japanese. Therefore, they are moving toward abolishment of the death penalty. It is important that this discourse on civilizations be understood.
========================================

Go figure.
The entire article translated with commentary by Michael H. Fox was recently published on Japan Focus. See
http://japanfocus.org/products/details/2609
Debito in Sapporo

Fun Facts #9: Divorce, Population decrease, Japan’s minus GDP growth, and inherited Nat’l Diet member seats

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Here are another series of “Fun Facts”–innocuous-looking statistics which open portals into grander trends at work:

Fact one: Divorce rate rocketing, as predicted by Debito.org.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////
-> National Chauvinistic Husbands Association
Courtesy Terrie’s Take #442, December 2, 2007

The advent of a new law back in April this year which allows women to seek half of their husband’s pension has spawned both a boom in divorces (up 6.1% in April alone) as well as a reactionary protest group called the National Chauvinistic Husbands Association (NCHA). The group says that the “chauvinistic” part of their moniker, “kanpaku” in Japanese, refers more accurately to the top assistant to the emperor in days gone by, rather than the current negative meaning that it has today. Regardless, the association faces an uphill battle. Apparently 70% of Japanese women are staying single until 29 or later, versus 75% of them being married at that age twenty years ago, and 95% of all divorce applications come from women. (Source: TT commentary from kansascity.com, Nov 29, 2007)

http://www.kansascity.com/238/story/382085.html
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: Surprised by both the jump and the fact that almost all people asking for divorce are women. I was in the tiny minority. More on the issue of divorce in Japan at https://www.debito.org/thedivorce.html

On to Fact 2: Japan’s imminent depopulation:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////
-> Workers to fall 10.7m in 22 years
Courtesy Terrie’s Take #441, November 25, 2007

The Labor Ministry has said that Japan’s working population will drop by around 17%, or 10.7m people, by 2030. This will cause the current labor force of 66.57m to fall to 55.84m. The Ministry says that the fall could be held to less than half this amount if more women and elderly joined the workforce. ***Ed: And tell us again why the Japanese government has turned xenophobic about foreigners living in Japan? It’s only a matter of time before the realities of the market force a mind shift in the politicians and bureaucrats who today are so busy trying to keep foreigners and their child-breeding ways out of Japan.** (Source: TT commentary from nikkei.co.jp, Nov 23, 2007)

http://www.nni.nikkei.co.jp/AC/TNKS/Nni20071122D22JFA10.htm
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: I will point out the irony behind the wan hope that forcing more women to work is actually going to help women want to have babies? And that the oft-touted development of robots (including this silly article from The Economist Dec 20th 2005 “Japan’s humanoid robots–Better than people: Why the Japanese want their robots to act more like humans”) is no elixir.

This leads us to Fact Three: Japan’s decreasing GDP Growth (in start contrast to the rest of the developed world. Courtesy of Niall Murtagh of The Community:

//////////////////////////////////////////////////
Debito — Interesting statistic on WBS news (World Biz Satellite) last night, December 2: can’t remember the figures exactly but in the 10 years from 1996 to 2006, GNP grew by over 50% in UK, Canada, Australia, 45%+ in France, Italy, and by about 2% in Japan.

In other words while Japan is not getting poorer, it is being left behind by nearly all other major (and minor) countries, as regards growth.

Immigration does seem to go in tandem with economic growth (from 1995-2005, non-nationals in Ireland went from almost none to 10% of population, while GNP increased by about 140%). It won’t happen here. Did a bit of quick googling and found figs that make the TV stats seem about right.

(Web site only gives figs in national currencies, so I calculated the % change).
It sure hasn’t been a great decade for Japan, even if statistics are only statistics!

——————————
GDP per capita, current prices
IMF World Economic Outlook and EconStats
http://www.econstats.com/weo/V016.htm
——————————
1996 – 2006 % change
——————————
Japan: -1.47
Italy 47.14
France 38.60
UK 61.29
Germany 22.94
Netherlands 47.79
Spain 84.45
Finland 59.11
Greece 103.54
Portugal 66.93
Switzerland 22.08
Ireland 153.17
Australia 59.33
NewZealand 43.33
Canada 54.76
Korea 87.64
China 131.90
US 51.34
——————————
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

COMMENT: Do people really think they’re being served by the powers that be that run this country? Although I’m well aware the true policymakers in this society are the faceless bureaucrats, the actual policymaking part of Japan that is not faceless–the Diet–is actually a peerage masquerading as an elected legislature.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////
“When you look at the figures, what can only be called a political class becomes clear. After the last election, for example, 185 of 480 Diet members (39%) are second- or third- (or more) generation politicians (seshuu seijika). Of 244 members of the LDP (the ruling party for practically all the postwar period), 126 (52%) are inherited. Eight of the last ten Prime Ministers were from inherited seats, as are around half of the Abe and Fukuda Cabinets. When you have an average turnover of only about 3% per election, the cream floats to the top, and debates become very closed-circuit…”
//////////////////////////////////////////////////

Courtesy the author. Excerpted from my upcoming Japan Times Zeit Gist column out December 20, 2007, Draft Six. Otanoshimi ni…

Arudou Debito in Sapporo
ENDS

Hokkaido Shinbun Editorial and article on NJ Fingerprinting Debacle

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Finally got around to translating this, sorry for the wait. Two articles from the Hokkaido Shinbun, Japan’s largest regional newspaper with near-monopoly readership in Hokkaido. Despite trying to sit on the fence when it came to The Otaru “Japanese Only” Onsens Case (1999-2005), this time they come out quite clearly with misgivings about the NJ Fingerprinting thingie. Editorial first, article second–the latter depicting the Korean media giving Japan a lot of stick.

Why do I get the feeling that the editors are reading Debito.org? Ki no sei? Debito in Sapporo

=================================
LACKING IN CONSIDERATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
The new Immigration procedures
Hokkaido Shinbun top editorial Tuesday, November 20, 2007, Morning Edition page 3
Original Japanese at https://www.debito.org/?p=821
Translated by Arudou Debito

Starting from today, a system requiring fingerprints and facial photos from Japanese coming to Japan comes into effect.

The goal is to stop terrorism. The fingerprints and photos will be instantly checked against a blacklist of terrorists and criminals, and if there is a problem, people will be refused entry at the border.

We understand the point of refusing terrorists at the shores. However, questions still remain about human rights, particularly privacy, when fingerprinting most of the 7,000,000 non-Japanese annually who come to Japan as if they were criminal suspects.

The bureaucrats in charge must not make decisions arbitrarily or on political grounds.

The system is grounded upon the amended Immigration and Refugee Control Act. We call for prudence when carrying out this policy:

First of all, there is nothing in the law which says how long these fingerprints or photos will be saved in a database. Immigration explains that “If we say how long, terrorists will wait until the end of the time limit and come in then.”

Although Japan is only the second country to create this biometric data program, after the United States, in America at least the time period for data storage is set at 75 years. That’s a person’s lifetime.

It is not inconceivable that the Japanese police will use this data in their criminal investigations. Chances are high that personal data will be leaked. We say that after the data is instantly checked against the database, it should be deleted immediately.

Second, the new powers granted the Minister of Justice under this amended law, to force people seen as “potential terrorists with the ability to easily carry out terrorist acts” (tero no jikkou o youi ni suru koui o okonau osore ga aru) to leave Japan’s borders, must be used properly.

Justice Minister Hatoyama Kunio said in a speech about these new regulations that a “friend of a friend of his is a member of al-Qaeda”. He was allegedly warned that there would be a terrorist bombing in Bali, Indonesia, two months before the event, and told to stay away.

But it is far too careless to assert that this person was indeed a member of al-Qaeda just based upon hearsay from a friend. If the Minister on this basis alone wishes to use his power to deport people, this is an abuse of his powers.

Third, the accuracy of this Blacklist they are putting together. In America, one out of every 500 citizens is now recorded on their blacklist as a terrorist suspect. It is said that even Nobel Peace Prize recipient Nelson Mandela is on it, and won’t be able to enter the United States.

All foreigners entering or leaving Japan [sic], except the Special Permanent Residents and children under 16, are to be targeted under this new system. That means 70% of all foreigners in Hokkaido. It won’t do to have our residents [shimin–meaning the editor is including NJ] mistakenly put on this list.

On the other hand, last month as an amendment to the employment laws, employers are now required to register the names and visa statuses of all their foreign workers gaining or changing employment. Now there is a systematic legal apparatus for administrating foreigners and all their personal information from entry through employment.

This apparently aims to reduce the number of illegal entrants, but having this strong an administration system is quite likely to increase foreigners’ ill feelings towards Japan. We must make sure that this inspection doesn’t result in violations of human rights.

ENDS
=================================

FINGERPRINTING, NEW IMMIGRATION SYSTEM STARTS
KOREAN TOURISTS DISPLEASED
MEDIA: “VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS”
Hokkaido Shinbun November 21, 2007
Translated by Arudou Debito

SUMMARY: A new Immigration system was brought on line on Nov 20 “for barring terrorists from entry”. In principle, this applies to foreigners over the age of 16 coming into Japan, where they will have their fingerprints and mug shots taken. Several vocally irate tourists were spotted at the international entry port at Chitose Airport. Korean media, the source of many of Japan’s tourists, was critical in its reporting, and the trend of public opinion may create the danger of a diplomatic flap.

———————–

Over the course of the day, 9 flights, including charters from Korea and Taiwan, brought about 1000 foreign tourists into Hokkaido. Korean tourist Kim Yong Gyun (65), who flew in from Pusan to Chitose, said with a bewildered look, “It’s not as if I feel good about having my fingerprints taken.” Machines were also breaking down, causing some consternation.

A semiconductor engineer from Seoul (37) did not contain his disdain. “This isn’t for catching terrorists. It’s for tightening the noose around overstayers. There’s absolutely no explanation whether or not they’ll protect our biometric data.”

Sapporo Immigration dealt with this with an emergency beefing up of inspection staff at Asahikawa, Hakodate, and Obihiro airports. Even then, at Hakodate Airport, a Korean Air flight of about 150 people were held up for an hour and 15 minutes, reckoned at about twice the usual duration. An airline staff member expressed his worry about the weekend, when the planes would actually be full.

On the other hands, the governments of their respective countries are withholding comment on the new system. Last year, of all the 410,000 total entrants into Hokkaido, the top group, at 134,000 people were Taiwanese, with Koreans coming in second. Both these countries have deep-rooted dislikes of Japan.

The Ministry of Justice sent representatives in October to the Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and asked for their understanding. Both Japanese and Korean diplomats were advising prudence towards possible ill-feelings.

The Korean media on Nov 20 all reported in unison this state of affairs. The online edition of The Hankyoreh Shinbum reported an angry arrival at Narita Airport saying, “Foreigners are being treated as criminal reinforcements; this is a violation of human rights.” Kim Dae Hyung, Tokyo correspondent, reported, “Korea is still relatively unaware of what’s going on over here, but as far as human rights are concerned, this is very problematic. The Korean Government might be holding its tongue for the sake of good relations, but in reality they are watching public opinion.”

=========================

SIDEBAR
Several people trigger alarm for having history of deportation
Obihiro, other places have trouble reading fingerprints.

A new system was brought online on Nov 20, where foreigners over the age of 16 must have their fingerprints and mug shots taken. As of 5PM Nov 20, according to the Ministry of Justice, several people have tripped the database for having fingerprints matching those of previously deported people, which has raised several questions (gimon ten ga shoujiru).

These people were asked more details later, and there is a chance they might be deported.

In addition, the Justice Ministry announced that at Obihiro, Narita, Chubu International, Fukuoka and Hakata, a total of 21 people were unable to have their fingerprints scanned. They say their fingers were too worn down, as they were elderly people.
=========================
ENDS

J Times: UNHCR’s Guterres bravely spins on Japan’s exclusionary refugee policy

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. The United Nations drops in, and tries to put a brave face on Japan’s inability to accept refugees or asylum seekers like any other developed country. Stressing improvements when there really aren’t any. He’s a diplomat, all right. Debito in Sapporo

===============================

UNHCR chief pitches third-country resettlement
By KAHO SHIMIZU Staff writer
The Japan Times November 29, 2007
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/print/nn20071129a5.html

Japan is notorious for accepting very few refugees, despite making a significant financial contribution to the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

But the visiting head of the U.N. organization said Tuesday that Japan is making steady progress in improving the situation facing asylum seekers here.

“Japan is not a country with many refugees . . . but the asylum system is moving in the right direction,” U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres told reporters during his three-day visit to Tokyo.

After arriving Monday, Guterres met with government officials, including Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama and Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura, and left the country Wednesday morning.

Japan was the UNHCR’s third-largest donor country in 2006, with a $75 million (¥8.1 billion) contribution, after being the second-largest donor for eight years through 2005.

However, the number of people granted refugee status in Japan remains small. In 2006, the government recognized only 34 people as refugees, compared with 23,296 in the U.S. and 6,330 in Britain.

Since assuming the top position at the UNHCR in 2005, Guterres, 58, said he has witnessed some improvements in Japan. These include the introduction of an appeal system to review cases of people whose applications for refugee status have been turned down, and the move by authorities to grant protection for people whose applications have been rejected but are allowed to stay for humanitarian reasons.

Above all, the most encouraging development for Guterres was that Japan has begun discussing the possible introduction of the third-country resettlement program, which means accepting refugees who sought asylum in other countries.

The UNHCR views resettlement in a third country as an important tool of protection and a durable solution for refugees, especially when voluntary repatriation to their home countries and local integration are difficult.

In September, the government set up a working group involving officials of the Justice Ministry, Foreign Ministry and other bodies, and began studying the program.

The U.S., Canada and Australia were among the first countries that began offering third-country resettlement opportunities, but although countries in South America, including Brazil and Argentina, recently introduced such a system, no Asian country has done so.

Guterres said he felt there is political will from the Justice Ministry and the Foreign Ministry to introduce the system because they are making a serious analysis of conditions to bring it about.

“We would very much appreciate that (if Japan becomes) the first Asian country to install the program,” Guterres said. But at the same time, the former Portuguese prime minister said the UNHCR does not want Japan to rush, nor is it necessary for Japan to accept a great number of refugees from the beginning, because the U.N. organization wants a system that really works to help asylum seekers.

People’s awareness about refugees in Japan is relatively low due in part to its geographical location, but Guterres said he was encouraged by growing interest among young people.

The Japan Times: Thursday, Nov. 29, 2007
ENDS

Anonymous on NJ Fingerprinting: Pre-registering in Shinagawa a farce.

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Just sent to me by a friend. It’s important enough to deserve its own blog entry. Arudou Debito

==========================

Ah, human rights. I have just come from the Shinagawa Immigration office where I went to pre-register my fingerprints and photograph pending my upcoming Christmas trip to the US with my children. Here are my few observations with some venting, I fear, in between. Is the US this bad about this process?

1. Process is disorganized. A makeshift area has been set up at the counter where people apply for re-entry permits. The area is closed off by privacy screens, so it is impossible to find the machine where you are supposed to take a number. Many people, including me, mistakenly took number cards from the machine reserved for re-entry applicants. Eventually they stationed an immigration officer with a fistful of number cards in the vicinity, but they neglected to paste onto his forehead a sign that says “get your numbers here”, so there was confusion whenever someone stepped up to the area to start the process.

2. None of the officers in attendance can speak English, even though many people had questions.

3. The fingerprint machines were not working. Some people had to wait and then redo their fingerprints. They could not read my index fingers with the machines and eventually had to read my middle fingers. One woman standing next to me could not read any of her fingers despite repeated attempts with both hands. I have no idea how she will re-enter the country.

4. There was not an excessive wait.

5. The officers in attendance do not have any idea how the process will work for the exit from Japan or the re-entry. There were maps of the Narita immigration area pasted up on screens, but the attending officers did not seem to know what the maps meant and responded Shirimasen when asked questions in Japanese. And even more helpful, these maps were pasted on the INSIDE of the screens, not on the OUTSIDE where they could be examined by the hordes of gaijins who presumably need to know where to go when they get to Narita.

6. Most important, it seems that if parents residing in Japan wish to use the automated gate process when leaving Japan or when returning, they will have to be separated from their children. Children are not required to give finger prints, but at the same time, at the automated re-entry gates there will be no human beings to inspect the passports of the children. Thus, for re-entering families, it appears that the adults can go through the automated gates but the children, if they have re-entry permits, must stand in the line like we always did for returning Japanese and re-entry permit holders and will enter Japan separately. Except that, obviously, if the child is a baby or not experienced enough to do this alone, then they have to come in through the tourist line with a parent. So at the end of the day, if a family wishes to stay together, or has to stay together because of the age of the child, they must go through the tourist line (Yes, I know, it seems obvious that we need fingerprint taking capability at the re-entry permit line). This question was asked many times by parents who came to immigration to get their re-entry pre-registration, but none of the officers in attendance could answer the question clearly, and there is no information available in English to explain this. They could not even answer when asked in Japanese. I found out because while I was standing in line I asked my secretary to call the Ministry of Justice to find out the procedure. And of course, I let it be known to the gaijins around me what she had learned. Boy, let me tell you, there was a ton of frustration among these parents who had taken time to come all the way out to Shinagawa to pre-register themselves thinking to spare their family and tired children the agony of the tourist line only to find out that it was a complete waste of time.

7. Another confusing point in the process relates to the distinction between passports that are machine readable and those that are not. US, UK and other countries issue machine readable passports. Philippines, Pakistan and many other countries do not. For those countries, the immigration office has to put a bar code sticker onto the passport so that it can be read by the machines. This resulted in the creation of two separate application lines, one for the star belly sneetches and one for those who have none. Unfortunately, there was only one fellow holding a fist full of numbers. So the result was that he would call a number, determine whether the applicant was a star belly sneetch or one who has none, and then would allocate people to separate sub-lines. Then there was the comedy of calling out numbers in apparently random order to deal with the separate lines. Number 30, number 16, number 33, number 17. Very confusing, and they did not explain to people why they were treated differently, until I asked in Japanese and explained to a Philipino in the line, so that the information about the bar codes was thereafter passed down the plain belly sneetch line among the Philippinos and Pakistanis.

So, in conclusion, it appears that the much touted automatic gate line is useful only for returning businessmen, single residents of Japan and families with children over the age of 16. Otherwise, brace yourself.

Enough said? not sure what I will do when I come home from the states. Have a great day.
ENDS

「人権週間」法務省の強調事項・有道 出人の批評

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Sent this out to my Japanese lists. Debito

「人権週間」法務省の強調事項・有道 出人の批評

　みなさまこんにちは。有道　出人です。いつもお世話になっております。

　さて、ご存知かどうかは分かりませんが、今週は「人権週間」でございます。法務省と全国人権擁護委員連合会は税金を使って色々なイベントを開催します。ただ、有意義であるのか、効果的であるのか、ましてや根本的にどんなような「主義」に基づき差別撤廃・意識高揚を行うのか、をこのメールで私は批評したいと思います。（私のコメントは引用するテキストの後です。）

　先ず、行政官からこの「人権週間」の目的についての説明を引用します：

出典：http://www.moj.go.jp/JINKEN/jinken03.html
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○人権週間とは？
　国際連合は，昭和２３年（１９４８年）第３回総会で世界人権宣言が採択されたのを記念し，昭和２５年（１９５０年）第５回総会において，世界人権宣言が採択された１２月１０日を人権デーと定めるとともに，すべての加盟国にこれを記念する行事を実施するよう呼びかけています。法務省と全国人権擁護委員連合会は，世界人権宣言が採択された翌年の昭和２４年から毎年１２月１０日の人権デーを最終日とする１週間を人権週間と定め，人権尊重思想の普及高揚のための啓発活動を全国的に展開しています。
一日人権擁護委員による街頭啓発 （甲府地方法務局）

人権イメージキャラクター人ＫＥＮまもる君・あゆみちゃんが小泉総理大臣（当時）を表敬訪問し、総理と共に人権の大切さを訴える
「第５９回　人権週間」強調事項（抜粋）
ーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーー
○「育てよう　一人一人の　人権意識」
_○「女性の人権を守ろう」 __　
○「子どもの人権を守ろう」 __
○「高齢者を大切にする心を育てよう」 __　
○「障害のある人の完全参加と平等を実現しよう」 __　
○「部落差別をなくそう」 __　
○「アイヌの人々に対する理解を深めよう」 __　
○「外国人の人権を尊重しよう」 __
○「ＨＩＶ感染者やハンセン病患者等に対する偏見をなくそう」 __
○「刑を終えて出所した人に対する偏見をなくそう」 __　
○「犯罪被害者とその家族の人権に配慮しよう」 __
○「インターネットを悪用した人権侵害は止めよう」 __　
○「性的指向を理由とする差別をなくそう」 __　
○「ホームレスに対する偏見をなくそう」 __　
○「性同一性障害を理由とする差別をなくそう」 __　
○「北朝鮮当局による人権侵害問題に対する認識を深めよう」 __

強調事項の詳細についてはこちら。
http://www.moj.go.jp/JINKEN/jinken03-01.html
ーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーーー
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詳細からDebito.orgは特に認識していることについて、こう書いてあります：
出典：http://www.moj.go.jp/JINKEN/jinken03-01.html
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○「外国人の人権を尊重しよう」

　近年の国際化時代を反映して，我が国に在留する外国人は年々急増しています。憲法は，権利の性質上，日本国民のみを対象としていると解されるものを除き，我が国に在留する外国人についても，等しく基本的人権の享有を保障していますが，現実には，我が国の歴史的経緯に由来する在日韓国・朝鮮人をめぐる問題のほか，言語，宗教，生活習慣等の違いから，外国人に対する就労差別やアパートやマンションへの入居拒否，飲食店等への入店拒否，公衆浴場での入浴拒否など様々な人権問題が発生しています。
　平成８年１月には，「あらゆる形態の人種差別の撤廃に関する条約」（人種差別撤廃条約）が我が国において発効し，人種差別や外国人差別等あらゆる差別の解消のための更なる取組が求められています。
　今後ますます国際化が進むことが予想される状況の中で，外国人のもつ文化を尊重し，その多様性を受け容れることが，国際社会の一員として望まれています。
　法務省の人権擁護機関としても，国民のすべてが，国内・国外を問わず，あらゆる人権問題についての理解と認識を深め，真に国際化時代にふさわしい人権意識をはぐくむよう啓発活動を展開していきます。
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有道　出人よりコメント：
もちろん、人権週間を開催しないよりも、した方がいいと思います。ただ、上記のテキストの中では、色々な面から人権が委ねている人権擁護部の盲点が現れています。

１）なぜ上記の文で「人種差別・身元差別」などではなく『外国人差別』のみと言われていますか。『国籍』が要因ですか。それだけではなく、国際結婚の子供は「日本人離れ」の顔があるならば、「外人扱い」になるケースがかなりある。日本人・日本国籍が有する人であるので、これは「外国人差別」に該当しません。これは人種差別です。これも「真に国際化時代」の一部です。人種差別は日本人にも悪影響となります。私は以前いくらでも人権擁護部に注意してもきかないです。

２）なぜ「我が国」に外国人が「在留」しているのみとの言い方ですか。「我々対外国」なら、外国人は「住民」ではないみたい。短期的な「在留」よりも「在住」や納税や社会貢献についてもう少し言及できませんしょうか。それこそ「多様性を受け容れること」だと思います。

３）なぜ「言語，宗教，生活習慣等の違い」が排他的の行動の説明になるのでしょうか。必ずしも違いがあるわけではいし、習慣などの違いがあったという証拠がなくても「外国人」は外見・身元のみで門前払いするケースが多いです。かえって「違いがあるから」を主張するのはたいてい差別主義者の弁解となり、同様に政府もそうやって言及するのは若干皮肉です。「習慣が違っても他国の人はちゃんと学べる」ことも無視となります。

４）人権擁護部がよく「尊重しよう」と言うが、なぜ人種差別撤廃法整備も唱えませんか。９６年から「遅滞なく法律も作る」と国連条約で公約したものの、ほぼ１２年間が経過しても「外国人差別」を撤廃措置と機能は行政府には未だにありません。人権擁護部さえ自分が「差別撤廃の拘束力はない」と認め、よって、立法がないと綺麗言葉に留まることとなりました。
https://www.debito.org/policeapology.html

要は、この「人権週間」は国連に伝えるようなアリバイ的な措置に留まるだけではないと信じたいですが。
https://www.debito.org/japanvsunj.html
税金の無駄遣いではないとも信じたいですが、頑張ります。
宜しくお願い致します。有道　出人
debito@debito.org
https://www.debito.org/nihongo.html
December 5, 2007
ENDS

GOJ Jinken Shuukan: “Human Rights Week” and its flaws

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. If you’ve been watching TV or been out in a few public places, you might have seen two cute-ish big boy and girl mascot dolls named “Ken” (for “kenri”, one’s rights, or “jinken”, human rights), drawing attention to issues of discrimination in Japan. Otherwise you might not know that we are in the middle of Japan’s official week for human rights. “Jinken Shuukan” started on December 3 and ends on December 10, or “Jinken Day”. Sponsored by the notorious Ministry of Justice’s Bureau of Human Rights (Jinken Yougo Bu, or BOHR–“notorious” for doing nothing much otherwise).

The website with this year’s 59th proceedings (thanks Stephanie) lists up these issues of note (my translations):
http://www.moj.go.jp/JINKEN/jinken03.html
========================
1) Teaching people one by one about the importance of human rights.
2) Human rights for women.
3) For children.
4) For the elderly.
5) For the disabled.
6) For the Burakumin.
7) For the Ainu.
8) For foreigners.
9) For people with AIDS or Hansen’s Disease (leprosy).
10) For formerly incarcerated criminals who have paid their debt to society.
11) For victims of crime and their families.
12) For the victims of human rights abuses on the Internet.
13) For people discriminated against for their sexual orientation.
14) For the homeless.
15) For those with Gender Identity Disorder.
16) For those who have suffered human rights abuses from the DPRK.
========================

As far as Debito.org goes, here is what they say about their goals towards discrimination against “foreigners” (gaikokujin) on a page with a longer writeup: (again, my translation):

========================
“LET’S RESPECT THE HUMAN RIGHTS OF FOREIGNERS”

Reflecting the era of Japan’s Internationalization in recent years, every year the number of foreigners staying (zairyuu) in our country (sic–waga kuni) has been increasing. According to the Constitution, and by the nature of the rights of man, and leaving out the interpretation that the Constitution only applies to Japanese citizens, foreigners staying in our country also are guaranteed fundamental human rights. However, in practice, our country has had issues originating in history towards the Zainichi North and South Koreans [sic–Chinese/Taiwanese etc. not included]. There are also various incidents of human rights problems with foreigners facing discrimination in the workplace, as well as being refused apartments, entry into eating and drinking establishments, and public baths [thanks]. This is due to differences in language, religion, and lifestyle customs [sic–not also race].

Our country effected the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in January 1996, which demands that we take further action towards the elimination of racial discrimination and discrimination by nationality.

As Japan’s internationalization is anticipated to further proceed from now on, it is desirable that we respect the customs of foreigners, and as a member of the international society we accept diversity.

The Ministry of Justice Bureau of Human Rights as an organization will develop enlightenment activities that will cultivate an awareness of human rights suitable for Japan’s international era, where all citizens (kokumin) here or abroad will deepen their understanding and awarenesss of all human rights problems.
========================

COMMENT: I’m not going to completely douse the fireworks here with acerbic comments (as it’s better that the GOJ is doing this than not, as long as they don’t claim to international bodies that this is enough–which they have a history of doing). But let’s do a quick roundup of the flaws in all the “human rights awareness” so ably called for by the BOHR:

a) Note how the BOHR still couches discrimination in terms of nationality, not as race or national origin. For what about the Japanese children with international roots, who face discrimination because they don’t “look Japanese”? This blind spot ignores one more facet of Japan’s true internationalization–where racial discrimination affects Japanese citizens too.

b) Note how the issue is still couched in terms of “us” and “them”–our citizens and those foreigners with their differences (which is not necessarily true–and this sort of thing is used more often as an excuse and a justification than an explanation). It’s not even clear that foreigners are even residents of Japan–only “staying” (zairyuu) as opposed to “residing” (zaijuu).

c) Still no call from the BOHR for an actual law outlawing racial discrimination–only for the “respect” for people (which, with 300 yen, might get you a cup of coffee; if the restaurant even lets you in).

d) And as I said above, the BOHR is famous for calling for action yet not effecting much (or any) action of its own–after all, as they will tell you at the very beginning of any interview you have with them over a human rights issue, they have no real power to stop a discriminator from discriminating, and (this they won’t tell you) have no legal obligation to call you back or tell you any results of any investigation (if any) they undertake (this is, they say, “for privacy concerns”). See what I mean at
https://www.debito.org/policeapology.html).

Glad to see that “discrimination against foreigners” is now up to eighth in the ranking. Now if we could get it rendered as “racial discrimination”, it would more reflect reality. And treaty obligation.

Arudou Debito in Sapporo
================
More Keystone Coppiness regarding GOJ human rights awareness:
“Human rights survey stinks: Government effort riddled with bias, bad science”
By Arudou Debito. The Japan Times, Tuesday, October 23, 2007
https://www.debito.org/japantimes102307.html
ENDS

Manitoban: NJ FP etc. “The Land of the Rising Shun”

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. An article in The Manitoban (Canada) using lots of information from Debito.org, dispersing what’s been going on in Japan vis-a-vis NJ in Japan legally, socially, and logistically over the past 50 years throughout the Canadian steppes. Mottainai. Best to also put it on Debito.org for a wider audience.

Article courtesy of the author, thanks. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

===============================
THE LAND OF THE RISING SHUN
THE MANITOBAN (Canada), November 14, 2007
By Trevor Bekolay
http://www.themanitoban.com/2007-2008/1114/127.The.Land.of.the.Rising.Shun.php

If you or anyone you know is planning to go to Japan, be advised that beginning Nov. 20, all non-Japanese people will be fingerprinted and photographed upon entering Japan.

Unlike other fingerprinting laws, such as the U.S.’s, Japan requires permanent residents (the equivalent of Green Card holders in the U.S.) to be fingerprinted and photographed every time they re-enter the country. Those fingerprints and photographs are kept on file for 70 years and can be made available to the police and other government agencies.

While one could argue that permanent residents should just apply for Japanese citizenship, obtaining citizenship is a long and arduous process, which requires residents to give up their current citizenship. Unless you are willing to make those sacrifices, you are a foreigner, and you must give up your biometric information every time you cross the Japanese border.

History of the fingerprinting law

This Japanese fingerprinting law is an updated version of a fingerprinting program implemented in 1952, after the American occupation of Japan following the Second World War. The original fingerprinting law met with firm opposition from foreign residents in Japan, especially the Zainichi. The Zainichi are ethnic Korean and Chinese people born and raised in Japan. Despite living most or all of their lives in Japan, and despite 90 per cent of Zainichi adopting Japanese names, the Zainichi must go through the same application process as other foreign residents to obtain citizenship.

The 1952 law was opposed on the grounds that it was an official expression of mistrust for all things foreign. It was an unnecessary humiliation and alienation of residents who had lived their whole lives alongside their Japanese peers — Zainichi children were often not aware that they were of a different ethnic background than their schoolmates until they were contacted at their school to have their fingerprints taken. Further, it associated all non-Japanese people with crime. By law, a Japanese person may only be fingerprinted if officially charged with a crime.

Eventually, people started refusing to submit to fingerprinting; first the Zainichi, then other foreign residents. Since this refusal meant jail for some, the number of legal battles skyrocketed — enough so that overseas media like Time Magazine and the New York Times picked up the story. In 1989, under heavy pressure, the government of Japan granted general amnesty, and by 1998 the law was completely abolished.

After the dust had settled, Immigration Bureau officials said that “the fingerprinting system appears to be ineffective in stopping or reducing the growing number of illegal immigrants and visa overstays in Japan.” The Ministry of Justice noted that “the practice could be construed as a violation of human rights.” Then why is this law being reinstated?

Fears of terrorism and foreign crime

Japan’s Ministry of Justice explains the motivation for reinstating the fingerprinting law: “By collecting personally identifying data, such as fingerprints and facial photos of visitors to Japan, we will be able to identify persons considered to pose security risks, such as terrorists, and persons travelling with passports that are not their own. This will help us prevent terrorist attacks.”

If Japan wishes to fight terrorism, then history tells us that it is the Japanese population that should be policed. The Sarin gas attack that took place on the Tokyo subway in 1995 was perpetrated by members of the Japanese religious group Aum Shinrikyo. In the 1970s, two Japan Airlines flights were hijacked by a terrorist group called the Japanese Red Army. There have been no terrorist attacks in Japan by non-Japanese in recent history.

The public support for the fingerprinting law could also be attributed to a fear of foreign crime among the Japanese. Since 2000, the National Police Agency (NPA) has been releasing updates on foreign crime every six months with detailed press releases. The media has been quick to report on these releases, and further support this with unbalanced reporting of foreign crime compared to Japanese crime. One study found that crimes by foreigners were 4.87 times more likely to be covered than crimes by Japanese. Even more frustrating is the way the NPA twists the statistics.

The semi-annual press releases note increases in foreign crime without a comparison to the state of Japanese crime. The increases in foreign crime do not take into account the increase in the foreign population; while the Japanese population has remained relatively static, the foreign population has been growing steadily over the past decade. Foreign crime is inflated by including visa overstays (a crime that a Japanese person cannot commit) with harder crimes. When proper statistical practices are used, foreign crime is rising in proportion to the rate of population increase, while Japanese crime has doubled within the past 10 years.

It is interesting to note that in 1999, before the first press release detailing foreign crime statistics, the NPA established the “Policy-making Committee Against Internationalization.” Would such a committee receive taxpayer money if foreign crime was on the decline?

If fears of terrorism and foreign crime are unfounded, then what is the main issue that surrounds the fingerprinting debate? It’s the same issue that has been the subject of many recent legal battles: racism and xenophobia.

Racism and xenophobia

By most accounts, since the Second World War, Japan has a good international record as a modern industrialized nation. Japan has the third largest economy in the world, manufacturing and designing goods for a worldwide market. Despite claims of homogeneity, Japan is home to over 2.5 million residents of non-Japanese ethnic backgrounds. Japan is a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council. Yet walking through Tokyo, you can find buildings with “Japanese only” signs posted on the front door. “Japanese only” signs have been found at bathhouses, bars, stores, hotels, restaurants, karaoke parlors, and pachinko parlors. How is this legal?

The unfortunate answer is that Japan has no law against racial discrimination. It is unconstitutional — article 14 of the Japanese Constitution states that there shall be no discrimination on the basis of race. Further, Japan signed and ratified the UN Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in 1996. So, in theory, racial discrimination should not be tolerated; in practice, the lack of a law forbidding racial discrimination allows discriminatory behaviour, such as the “Japanese only” signs, to continue.

And these signs are unarguably discriminating on the basis of race. Social activist Arudou Debito became a naturalized citizen in 2000, after being denied entrance to a public hot springs in Hokkaido. Upon returning to the establishment a Japanese citizen, he was still refused entry to avoid confusion from the other customers. He sued the owner of the hot springs for racial discrimination and was met with moderate success. While he won some judgments, he lost an important decision when his appeal to the Supreme Court was dismissed for “not involving any constitutional issues.” The story of the incident at the hot springs and the ensuing legal battle is chronicled in his book Japanese Only.

Debito is not the only person to take these matters to the courtroom. In 1997, Brazilian Ana Bortz was asked by a jewelry store’s owner to leave his store, which had a strict no-foreigners policy. The store owner accused Bortz of planning a robbery. Bortz sued the store owner for violating her human rights, using the security camera footage as evidence. The judge ruled in Bortz’s favour, sentencing the store owner to pay 1,500,000 yen (approximately C$12,300) in damages and legal fees. The judge cited two articles of the UN Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, setting a good legal precedent for future discrimination cases.

Or did it? In 2004, Steven McGowan, a 41-year-old black man residing in Kyoto, was refused entry to an eyeglasses store in Osaka. Steve claims that the store owner said, “Go away. I hate black people.” Steve lost his case in a lower court because the judge did not believe that Steve’s Japanese language ability was good enough to accurately determine what the store owner said. Even after further investigation by McGowan’s Japanese spouse, the judge was not convinced that Steve was discriminated against because of his race, rather than his foreign status (the Japanese words for black person and foreigner are very similar). McGowan appealed to a higher court and was awarded 350,000 yen in damages; yet even at the high court, the judge remarked that the store owner’s remarks were “not enough to be considered racially discriminatory.” These decisions set the dangerous precedent that testimony by non-Japanese cannot be trusted if they are not completely fluent in Japanese. It also demonstrates the power one judge can have in Japan’s juryless court system.

A plea to Japan

In discussing these issues, it may seem that I have some disdain for Japanese culture. This can’t be farther from the truth — it is my fascination with and interest in Japanese culture that compels me to bring these issues to the forefront. It is only through open dialogue that conditions will improve for both Japanese and non-Japanese residents.

If Japan does not change its immigration policies, and birth rates continue at the current rate, Japan’s population will plummet from today’s 127 million to 100 million in 2050. It will become very difficult to maintain economic strength with such a reduced work force. Immigration is the easiest and most sustainable answer to Japan’s population crisis.

With increased immigration, there will have to be widespread changes in media and education. Though this seems prohibitively difficult at the moment, Japan’s rapid industrialization is proof that it is possible. By working together with its new generation of international citizens, I foresee Japan having a modernization of culture that will rival its rise to economic greatness.
—————————-

Trevor Bekolay studied Japanese language, history and culture at Tokyo’s Kokugakuin University in 2005.
ENDS

Reminder: Documentary on J Child Abduction fundraiser Dec 11 Shibuya, RSVP by Dec 4

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Quick reminder about the “For Taka and Mana” film documentary:

FOR TAKA AND MANA
Documentary on Japan Child Abduction after Divorces
Fundraiser Party Dec 11 Shibuya, RSVP by Dec 4 (i.e. tomorrow)

Quick reminder about the “For Taka and Mana” film documentary fundraiser coming up on December 11 at the Pink Cow, Shibuya. See movie poster and map to the venue below, in this blog entry.
RSVPs please by December 4.

This is the issue: Divorce in Japan is extremely problematic. As Japan has neither joint custody nor visitation rights guaranteed by law, after a break-up, generally one parent loses all access to the children. This is especially difficult in the case in an international marriage, where the venue may be intercontinental (and access denied due to visa problems), and where there is NO precedent of a non-Japanese plaintiff being awarded custody of a child in Japanese court (quite the opposite, as the Murray Wood Case, the subject of this documentary, indicates–Japanese courts even overruled a Canadian provincial supreme court awarding custody to Murray shortly before the mother abducted their children to Japan).

Due in part to the vagaries of the Family Registry (koseki) system, which non-citizens do not have in Japan, foreigners essentially have NO family rights in Japan in a Family-Court dispute. It’s complicated, but as simply as possible: NJ are not officially registered as a member of a Japanese family after (or even before) a divorce, and cannot “keep” their children registered under their own Japanese family unit as a single parent.
https://www.debito.org/ayakoseki.jpg

With the increase of international marriage in Japan (from 30,000 couples to 40,000 couples per year since this century began), this situation warrants attention. This documentary is one way. I have been quite closely associated with this project for more than a year now (I’m interviewed in the film–see a trailer from the link below), and have a personal stake in the subject–since I too have not seen my own children for years following my marital separation and divorce. I encourage you to join us next week for the fundraiser (I’m flying down specially to be there), help out in any way you can, and even perhaps suggest venues we could appear at to get the word out.

An update for the fundraiser from directors Matt Antell and Dave Hearn follows. Arudou Debito in Sapporo

===========================

We will have at least one more new clip in addition to the current trailer at our website http://www.fortakaandmana.com.

We have a wide array of speakers lined up to show the depth of the problem of parental abduction in Japan including the well traveled, Debito Arudou.

Schedule of events in Powerpoint format downloadable from here.

Some of the stories you will hear are just amazing. The food is fantastic and the first two drinks come with the ticket price of 10,000 yen.

There are still some seats left so please e-mail Dave at: dave@fortakaandmana.com or call 0905-313-9702 RSVP by Dec. 4th.

We very much hope to see you there.

Matt Antell and Dave Hearn
fortakaandmanaposter2.jpg

Asahi: US-VISIT database riddled with mistakes: 38% of entries

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Forwarded by a friend. So much for the effectiveness of the US-VISIT system the current Japanese NJ fingerprinting regime is modeled upon. First the source of the article (the table of contents), then the article with pertinent sections underlined. The article, btw, has long been unavailable online at Asahi.com. No wonder. Which is why I had to wait until I got this source. Arudou Debito

======================================
AMERICAN EMBASSY, TOKYO
PUBLIC AFFAIRS SECTION
OFFICE OF TRANSLATION AND MEDIA ANALYSIS
INQUIRIES: 03-3224-5360
INTERNET E-MAIL ADDRESS: otmatokyo@state.gov
DAILY SUMMARY OF JAPANESE PRESS
November 21, 2007

INDEX:
(1) US needs to see progress in nuclear, abduction issues for N. Korea delisting: Bush [Sankei] 2
(2) Fukuda diplomacy takes first step toward “synergy”: Premier Wen reacts favorably [Asahi] 3
(3) Leaders of Japan, China, South Korea play up friendly mood, laying aside pending issues [Nikkei] 4
(4) Nukaga treated by Mitsubishi [Akahata] 6
(5) Editorial: Do we want to entrust the compilation of the state budget to Finance Minister Nukaga? [Asahi] 6
(6) Ruling, opposition parties to find way to reach agreement on bills [Asahi] 7
(7) US N-flattop unsettles local host communities [Tokyo Shimbun] 9
(8) US system of screening visitors: mistakes, contradictions found in 38% of those cited on monitoring list [Asahi] 10
(9) Policy watch: Face up to the economy slipping [Sankei] 11
(10) TOP HEADLINES 13
(11) EDITORIALS 13
(12) Political Cartoon 15
** Next Daily Summary will be issued on November 26. **
EXCERPT

(8) US system of screening visitors: mistakes, contradictions found in 38% of those cited on monitoring list

ASAHI (Page 2) (Excerpts)
November 19, 2007

Arriving foreign visitors form a long line at the immigration section at John F Kennedy Airport in New York to have their fingerprints taken from the index finger of each hand. Visitors have to wait for more than one hour when a number of flights arrive.

The US-visit system was introduced in 2004. The system is almost the same as Japan’s. Anna Hinken, an officer of the US Department of Homeland Security, proudly said: “We have rejected the entry of more than 2,000 persons who were considered a security risk since the system was introduced.”

But a US government agency poses questions about the system’s technology and credibility. This July, the US General Accounting Office criticized the US-visit system as seriously fragile in view of information control. He pointed out the possibility that personal data, including fingerprint data, might be altered or copied by someone from the outside due to insufficient security measures.

In September, an auditor of the Justice Department emphasized how inaccurate US blacklists are. The auditor said that as a result of a sampling check of the terrorism-affiliates included in a monitoring list, mistakes or contradictions were found in 38% of those checked, with the names of some terror suspects left out of the list or innocent persons appearing on it.

The monitoring list was compiled by integrating those of such government agencies as the FBI and the Transportation Security Administration, and the list is not open to the public. As of April this year, the number of those listed was 700,000. The number reportedly increases by 20,000 per month.

American Civil Liberties Union member Barry Steinhardt said: “There should not be so many terrorists. The list is unreliable. In addition, since the list is classified and not publicized, it is impossible to check how effectively it has worked to prevent terrorism.”

The monitoring list has also affected civic life. There are cases in which citizens unrelated to terrorism appeared on the list or in which a person who has the same family and personal name as a certain suspect was stopped at an airport security check.

The US-visit system also tends to give travelers an unpleasant impression about the nation.
ENDS

BBC: Japan visa regime “abuses foreign workers” with “forced labour”

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. When things get busy (as they are right now, writing this from on-site at JALT), I’ll put up some backlogged articles that are still germane to Debito.org. Arudou Debito in Tokyo

================================
Japan scheme ‘abuses foreign workers’
By Chris Hogg
BBC News, Tokyo, Wednesday, 3 October 2007, 11:24 GMT 12:24 UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/asia-pacific/7014960.stm

Over the past 17 years, thousands of foreign workers have travelled to Japan, taking part in an official scheme to learn skills they cannot pick up in their own countries.

But this year the Japanese government’s own experts have admitted that in many cases trainees are used as cheap labour.

The US state department has gone further. In its annual report on human trafficking, it said that “some migrant workers are reportedly subjected to conditions of forced labour through [its] foreign trainee programme”.

Wang Jun came to Japan on the trainee scheme “because Japan is the most advanced country in Asia, and so that I can learn skills here then go back to my own country and get a good job”.

Mr Wang works at a small factory in a suburb of Tokyo. He is one of four trainees in the workshop, toiling alongside 11 Japanese workers.

He sounds like he is getting the kind of experience he is supposed to on this scheme. It was set up in 1990, in order, the Japanese government says, to help poorer countries learn from Japan’s mastery of the manufacturing process.

Toshikazu Funakubo, the factory owner’s son, said it could be difficult to communicate with the Chinese workers. “But they are learning the Japanese culture and language. It’s a very good thing for all of us.”

The owner of the business, Toshiaki Funakubo, said he employed the Chinese workers because he wanted to help China. But he admitted that labour shortages in Japan were another important consideration.

“To tell the truth I want Japanese people to join my company, but at the moment we have no choice but to depend on good workers from abroad.”

Cultural ‘integrity’

The problem is that widespread public aversion in Japan to the idea of immigration has contributed to a shortage of labour.

In the United States, foreign workers make up 15% of the workforce. In Japan the figure is little more than 1%.

The job description, the working hours are the same. But the salary and treatment are so different. I cannot understand this
Chinese trainee
A recent government report into its own foreign workers scheme found that, in reality, trainees are used as cheap labour and their working conditions are not properly monitored.

“The Japanese government and the ministries do not want Japan to become an immigration country,” said Martin Schulz, a research fellow at the Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo.

“They do not want to change the cultural and social integrity of Japan, so they have a rather hands-off approach.”

That hands-off approach can lead to abuses. When the government made unannounced inspections to firms employing foreign trainees last year it found that 80% of them were breaking the laws on pay and conditions.

Some of those who are treated badly on the scheme find their way to the offices of the Zentoitsu (All United) Workers Union, in the Akiharbara district of Tokyo.

‘Sexual harassment’

One Chinese trainee said he discovered a disparity between his pay and that of other workers, but when he complained he was told that if he did not like it he could go back to China.

He did not want to give his name as he is afraid of reprisals.

“Chinese workers here do the same work as Japanese workers,” he said. “The job description, the working hours are the same. But the salary and treatment are so different. I cannot understand this.”

Hiroshi Nakajima, the union official helping him with his case, said a foreign worker came to ask for help almost every week.

“Basically they have many complaints about their labour conditions. For example, non-payment and sometimes threat of dismissal, and not only these things but sometimes sexual harassment and sometimes the company keeps their passport or alien card and insurance card too,” he said.

Japan International Training Co-operation Organisation (Jitco), which runs the scheme for the government, said it was aware of media reports about trainees’ troubles.

But said its own research showed foreign workers were satisfied with the way they were treated.

In a statement, Jitco told the BBC that individual cases should not be used to generalise about the whole scheme.

And yet the Japanese government’s own panel of experts has decided there is a need for stiffer penalties for companies that mistreat workers.

These will not be introduced for at least two years, though. It is an acknowledgement that the system is not working, but it seems there is no rush to fix it.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/asia-pacific/7014960.stm

Published: 2007/10/03 11:24:33 GMT

© BBC MMVII

Fingerprinting: Anger in the Blogosphere

Posted on by Debito Arudou, Ph.D.

mytest

Hi Blog. Lots to do this weekend in Tokyo at JALT, so I’ll be brief:

In all my twenty years of Japan, I’ve never seen the NJ communities so angry.

Not during the “gaijin all have AIDS” scare of 1986, the Otaru Onsens Case of 1999, the Ishihara anti-gaijin anti-crime “Sangokujin Speech” media campaigns of 2000, the “anti-hooligan” scare before and during World Cup 2002, the Al-Qaeda scare of 2005, or the “foreign crime is rising” National Police Agency media campaigns every six months. This time, there’s a very “faith no more” element to it all.

I am receiving links to angry diatribes on the Fingerprint policy in the Blogosphere. Two that leave a lasting impression:

Running Gaijin Card Checks
http://www.keepingpaceinjapan.com/2007/11/running-in-fear.html

Oppose Japan’s bid for The Olympics
http://nofj16.googlepages.com/home

If you know of any more, please send links to the comments section below. Angry, humorous, ironic, and/or poignant is fine, racist is not, so exercise discretion.

The point is, how else are NJ going to express their anger when they are this disenfranchised in Japanese society? Where the media machines for manufacturing consent will ultimately pit the entire Japanese society against the “gaijin”–through completely unfounded assertions of criminality, terrorism, and allegedly effective preventative measures which single people out for discrimination by race, nationality, and national origin.

How else? The Blogosphere. Vent away.

How things work over here to create “Team Japan vs. The World” has never come out as clearly as now. Arudou Debito in Tokyo