Weekly Highlights from the Japanese Press No. 12
From the Asahi Shinbun for June 3 through June 9
Weekly Highlights from the Japanese Press No. 12
From the Asahi Shinbun for June 3 through June 9
June 3
The defense ministers of Japan, the Republic of Korea, and the United States, Kihara Minoru, Shin Won-sik, and Lloyd Austin respectively, agreed at a meeting in Singapore on June 7 to hold joint trilateral drills involving land, sea, and air forces this summer. Austin also welcomed the agreement between Japan and RoK to take measures to prevent a repeat of the radar lock-on incident. The three affirmed their commitment to strengthening cooperation with respect to North Korea, to holding further talks between the ministers, chiefs of staff, and working level military officials of each country, and to upholding international law in the South Pacific against further Chinese incursions.
Head of Asahi’s Seoul branch Inada Kiyohide contributes a very long piece to the Reporter Commentary portion of the Opinion section entitled, “Toward ‘Sustainable’ Japan-Korean Relations.” He says that, although President Yoon Suk Yeol has made tremendous contributions to improving Japan-Korean relations, by, for instance, having foundations run by the Korean government pay compensation to plaintiffs in the trials that families of forced laborers have been lodging against the Japanese government, there are signs that the Korean youth is less animated by the problems of history and memory that have plagued the two countries, and private organizations like Keidanren and universities have made moves to strengthen ties to their counterparts in Korea, there remain major obstacles to sustainable smooth relations between the two. First, Yoon’s approval rating is at only 20%, and a former Korean ambassador to Japan noted indirectly that his attempts to improve relations with Japan have not gained the understanding and support of the people. Second, not only has his decision with respect to wartime forced labor been decried as absolving Japanese companies of responsibility, but the increase in such cases since then threatens to upset the finances of his government. Third, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications issued orders to LINE Yahoo in response to recent leaks of user data including an order to reconsider its relationship to NAVER, which holds a 42% stake in the company. This has been interpreted as an act of discrimination in Korea and threatens to further strain relations. Inada calls for both countries to continue public and private debate, face the past, overcome their differences, and deal with immediate causes of anxiety in order to form a basis for lasting positive relations between Japan and RoK.
The Ministry of Defense has revealed more details concerning the two helicopters that crashed on April 20, leading to the death of one and the disappearance of seven. As part of an attempt to confirm the ability of pilots to detect and pursue hostile submarines, that night the commander of Escort Flotilla 4 without warning ordered three helicopter pilots to perform detection and pursuit drills in response to the scenario in which a transport vessel had been attacked with torpedoes by a hostile enemy submarine, which they rushed to do. Pilots were supposed to drop suspended sonars into the water while hovering, but the Maritime SDF investigation found that the collision took place before they had even had an opportunity to do so. At the beginning of this month, the Ministry of Defense announced its intention to replace head of Escort Flotilla 4 Nakaōji Makoto.
June 4
In interviews with reporters for the Asahi and other outlets, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced his intention to place a general in charge of US forces in Japan. At present, US forces on Japanese soil are headed by a lieutenant general with no standing to lead operations during emergencies or drills, with that right resting with the Hawaii-based US Indo-Pacific Command, which is responsible for the entire area from India to Japan. US forces in Korea are similarly subordinated to Indo-Pacific Command, but are headed by a general. Secretary Austin did not reveal his other plans for strengthening command and control links between US forces and the Japan SDF, a policy that was announced in April.
Figures within the LDP and other parties who support the recent bid for constitutional revision have stated that they may submit their proposed revisions within this session of the Diet. This would mark the first time in postwar history that a serious attempt to revise the constitution has been made. Two methods exist for submitting proposals to the Diet. 1. The head of the Constitutional Committee may submit revisions with the consent of all parties. 2. Diet members may do so with the support of at least one hundred members of the House of Representatives and 50 members of the House of Councillors. Supporters of revision are now saying that they may opt for the second option. The author of the article states that the LDP has considered its “forced policy” in order to shore up Kishida’s position, as conservative leaders in the LDP, who are otherwise hostile to him and have been seeking his removal, would not allow the first prime minister to actually attempt revision to be removed from office. The author consulted professor of constitutional law at Kyūshū University Akasaka Kōichi, who stated that such a move would mean that all the debates in the committee had been for naught and damage trust between parties; he believes that it is desirable that such a plan be submitted only with the consent of all factions.
On June 3, the government made public its plans for early intake and rehousing of those who would become refugees from five frontline islands in Okinawa that would be affected in case of a PRC attack on Taiwan. Chief Cabinet Secretary Hayashi Yoshimasa participated remotely in a meeting of the governors of the Kyūshū region during which he specified which cities, towns, and villages each prefecture would intake refugees from. During a press conference, Hayashi stated that by the end of the year they will have Yamaguchi Prefecture and the prefectures of Kyūshū draft a plan for the initial month of refugee resettlement.
A special educational section directed at children and put together by educational advisor at Asahi’s EduA Shimizu Akihiro invites his presumably underage readers to reconsider what it means to be Japanese. The format is for the reader write their own opinion in two hundred characters after having read a short text. The short text provided in this issue is a transcribed interview with Cameroonian national, manga creator, and “talent” Hoshino Rune, whose mother married a Japanese researcher and brought him to Japan when he was four. Although he retains his Cameroonian citizenship, he considers himself Japanese, and argues that culture, meaning all the things that people who live in a specific place happen to do, is what defines Japaneseness, not blood. To the left of the transcribed interview is an example response by a fourth grader which says that Hoshino should consider himself Japanese, because Japaneseness is determined by internal things, like whether or not you think that it is normal and obvious to use kana and Chinese characters and chopsticks like most Japanese do. Anyone who considers these things obvious should consider themselves Japanese.
June 5
On June 4, proposed revisions to the Child Welfare Act and other related laws that are intended to counteract the declining birthrate were approved by the House of Councillors Cabinet Committee. It is expected that the revisions will be formally passed into law by the House of Councillors on June 5.
On June 4, the bill ratifying the treaty establishing GIGO, the government body that would manage contracts with companies and exports relating to the next-generation fighters jointly developed with the UK and Italy, was passed by the House of Councillors Diplomacy and Defense Committee. The government already legalized the export of such weapons in March. Unlike the United States, the Japanese government does not need the approval of the Diet to export weapons abroad, however large the sales may be. The CDP and JCP in particular take issue with the aforementioned draft bill because it does not include provisions for establishing parliamentary oversight, but the former approves of its passage anyway.
On June 4, the government approved Tokyo Metropolis, Osaka City, Fukuoka City, and Sapporo as Special Financial and Investment Activity Zones in a bid to attract foreign capital to revitalize Japan’s economy. The plan is to encourage foreign investment by permitting foreign investors and foreigners interested in establishing start-ups in Japan to reside in these areas under newly created visa categories while exempt from or subject to lower regional taxes under condition that they invest in Japanese start-ups and pay national taxes in full.
June 6
On June 5, proposed revisions to the Child Welfare Act and other related laws that are intended to counteract the declining birthrate were approved by a majority vote of the parties in power and passed into law. Expanded childcare support payments will first be disbursed in December, and the funding for these measures through a surcharge on medical insurance is expected to reach one trillion yen (about 6,328,000,000 US dollars) by 2028. Its main pillar is expanded childcare support payments, with restrictions on income having been abolished and the period of disbursement extended from middle school to high school. For the third child and subsequent children the sum is increased to 30,000 yen per month (about 192 USD). The increase in childcare allowance payments will begin in January 2025. Beginning in April 2025, an allowance of 100,000 yen (about 640 USD) for pregnant women, a raise of paid childcare leave from 80% to 100% of salary, and an allowance of 10% of salary if parents of a child less than two years old opt for reduced working hours will come into force. A system of daycare facilities that children can use regardless of parent income will be implemented in 2026. “Young carers,” who previously lacked legal definition and no legal basis for being eligible for support, have been given clear legal status with this law. Support for daycare will be incrementally increased beginning with 600,000,000,000 yen (about 3,796,800,000 US dollars) in 2026 and growing to 800,000,000,000 yen (about 5,062,400,000 US dollars) in 2027 and 1,000,000,000,000 yen (about 6,328,000,000 US dollars) in 2028. The surcharge on insurance payments is projected to be 800 yen (about 5 US dollars) per month for employees on company insurance, 400 yen (about 2.50 US dollars) per month for the self-employed and others on national health insurance, and 350 yen (about 2.25 US dollars) per month for those above the age of 75 under the late old age healthcare system. The government has set goals for the 2030s which are likely to require taxpayers to bear an even greater burden.
Regarding daycare, children between six months and two years of age who are not yet attending daycare are eligible, but the government will guarantee support of only up to ten hours per month per child. According to a survey of daycare workers carried out by an NGO called Florence last year, most call for at least three days per week and at least three hours per day. At the same time, there are not enough daycare workers, and according to an official in Tokyo Metropolitan government, the daycares there are just barely hanging on and are always putting out ads for new workers. Further, the author of the article complains that there is not enough support for single-parent families, 44.5% of which are below the poverty line.
According to the Ministry of Defense Whitepaper for 2024, one cannot exclude the possibility that increased aggressive activity on the part of the PRC and North Korea may produce in East Asia the same sort of crisis situation that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has produced in Europe. PRC activity in Japanese waters and airspace, particularly that near the Senkaku Islands and the recent joint flights with Russia, is intended to be a “demonstration” directed at Japan, and the balance of forces between the PRC and Taiwan has rapidly shifted in favor of the former. In order to acquire urgently needed counterstrike capabilities, Japan is accelerating the acquisition of Tomahawks and Type-12 surface to ship missiles by one year in order to have them on hand by 2025.
Local governments are struggling with the system of tax reductions and allowances that came into effect this month. Each individual will see their income tax reduced by 30,000 yen (about 192 US dollars) and their residence tax by about 10,000 yen (about 64 US dollars). As this will lead to an increase in the number of those who pay so little tax in the first place that their tax burden cannot be meaningfully reduced to 32,000,000, the government is implementing a system of allowances for those individuals to balance this. That is, the difference between the tax exemption that such households are supposed to receive and the amount that they actually receive will be paid out to them directly. A household of four that is supposed to receive an exemption of 160,000 yen (about 1024 US dollars) but in the first place pays only 100,000 yen (about 640 US dollars) in taxes will receive the remaining 60,000 yen (about 384 US dollars) as a direct payment. Local governments are complaining that it is difficult to calculate who will receive an exemption of how much and who will receive an allowance of how much under this system.
Real wages for April 2024 declined by 0.7% compared to April 2023, marking the twenty-fifth month of continuous decline in real wages, the longest in Japanese history, and that despite the success of labor unions in winning a 2.3% raise in the minimum wage, the largest such increase in 30 years, because the price of goods has continued to increase. The article notes that the effects of the tax reductions and allowances that come into force this month will not be reflected in the statistics for real wages, as those are calculated on the basis of income prior to taxation.
June 7
Revisions to the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act that would grant the state the right to deport persons applying for refugee status on their third or subsequent attempt unless they have presented compelling evidence that they deserve refugee status will come into effect on June 10. Previously, the state could not deport anyone whose application for refugee status was still under review.
The revised Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act is being criticized by some. One reason they give is that on some occasions, local courts order the central government to grant individuals whose applications for refugee status have been repeatedly rejected that status. For instance, on four occasions the applications for refugee status submitted by a Myanmar national of Rohingya background who lives in Nagoya with his wife and two children of elementary school age have been rejected, but in January of this year the High Court of Nagoya ordered the Japanese government to grant him that status. Under the new revisions, such judicial rulings could potentially lose their ability to change the decisions of the central government, and the decision to deport would be left entirely to the discretion of the latter. The High Courts of Tokyo and Nagoya issued similar rulings in December 2023 and May 2024 for a Ugandan male and Syrian male national respectively. In Warabi and Kawaguchi, both cities in Saitama Prefecture, three thousand Kurds, mostly from Turkey, live, many with their families and small children. A large number of them have no official residential status and have repeatedly seen their applications for refugee status rejected. A 22 year old Kurdish male came to Japan at the age of 11 with his mother and two younger sisters to be with their father, who had already moved to the country. He has attended Japanese schools his entire life, have many Japanese friends, but has no official residential status. He has a younger brother who was born after they moved to Japan, but that brother has no residential status. A Kurdish man in his forties came to Japan thirty years ago and has been married to a Japanese woman for ten years, but still has no official residential status and, according to the article, is engaged in no employment.
June 8
On June 7, revisions to the Act on the Control of the Possession of Firearms, Swords, and Other Weapons that make it illegal to encourage the possession of firearms, post manuals or instructions for building 3D firearms, and post that one is willing to sell such firearms were passed into law by the House of Councillors. Such actions are now punishable by up to one year of penal servitude or a fine of up to 300,000 yen (about 1,920 US dollars). These revisions are made in response to Yamagami Tetsuya’s assassination of former Prime Minister Abe Shinzō with homemade firearms constructed using an online video guide. The law also changes the definition of rifles and makes it more difficult to obtain a license to own “half-rifles,” or shotguns with semi-rifled barrels that fire sabot slugs used only for hunting in Japan, by restricting their ownership to individuals who have had a license to possess hunting rifles for at least ten years, in response to the killing of four in Nagano Prefecture, Nakano City in May last year with a “half-rifle.” The law will come into effect in March 2025.
June 9
For the Forum part of the Opinion section, Asahi consulted Miki Nayuta, a male to female trans professor of communications and philosophy of language at Ōsaka University, the third most prestigious national university in the country, on the problem of mansplaining. The details need not detain us.