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Minister of Justice Mr. NOZAWA Daizo Request to Stop the Solicitation and Provision of Information on the Homepage of the Ministry of Justice Immigration Control Bureau On 16 February 2004 the Ministry of Justice Immigration Control Bureau began accepting on their homepage ¡ÈInformation Concerning Foreigners who are Overstaying, etc.¡É With this, if one inputs personal information such as the name, nationality, address, telephone number, workplace, or other information which would verify an individual, it is forwarded automatically as e-mail to the local immigration office in the jurisdiction, without disclosing the name, address, or e-mail address of the informant. Anyone could easily provide such information. We are deeply disturbed by this solicitation of information which one might call ¡ÈForeigner Hunting,¡É and we request its immediate cessation.There are over 2,000,000 foreigners now living in Japan. No matter what their visa status, they live, work, and commute to school, just like the rest of us Japanese. They are our colleagues and our neighbors. Foreigners who work in small-to-medium sized enterprises and factories, and on construction sites, are sustaining Japanese industry and the whole economy. Moreover, the strong rights consciousness that foreign workers hold is raising the consciousness of Japanese, and activities surrounding labor unions and human rights and peace are enlivened by them. When foreigners of many different racial, ethnic and religious backgrounds live in our neighborhoods, Japanese learn mutual respect for others, becoming a more diverse and rich multiethnic society where many cultures can coexist. The e-mail information solicitation of the Ministry of Justice Immigration Control Bureau goes against this trend, induces residents to police foreigners, fans anti-foreign sentiment, and feeds the tendency to equate ¡Èforeigners¡É with ¡Ècriminals.¡É A system that polices and secretly reports as ¡Ècriminals¡É the foreign residents who are our good neighbors and colleagues tramples the human rights of foreigners. We cannot permit this sort of system. Facilitating the ¡Èeasy¡É disclosure in secret of such personal information by e-mail harms the mutual trust of local residents and creates a society of suspicion. This undermines our democracy. We request the Ministry of Justice to cease immediately the e-mail solicitation of information on its home-page that infringes upon the human rights of foreigners in Japan. The best way to solve the problem of irregular stayers is to regularize their residency status according to the reality of their livelihoods in Japan. We ask that the Japanese government change this policy to one that moves us toward a multiethnic, multicultural, co-existent society. 2/19/2004 Solidarity Network with Migrants Japan The Committee for the Day for Migrant Workers' Rights Created byStaff. Created on 2004-03-22 20:42:00 / Last modified on 2005-09-06 04:53:18 Copyright: Default |