[ilbegone]

This one's old... UC Davis 1997

More than 1,070 illegal immigrants have been arrested in Japan since January, compared with 679 in all of 1996. The National Police Agency reports that 90 percent of the illegal immigrants arrested were Chinese, most from Fujian Province.

More... http://migration.ucdavis.edu/mn/more.php?id=1373_0_3_0

2004 BBC

Japanese authorities say there are 250,000 illegal immigrants, the majority of whom entered the country on a temporary visa and over-stayed. Many of these people are thought to work as unskilled labourers.

More... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3708098.stm

Japan introduces ID cards to sniff out illegal immigrants

By Alice Kok | 2 March 2009

More... http://www.futuregov.asia/articles/2...llegal-immigr/

2010

Japan’s Ministry of Justice issued a reported stating that illegal immigrant numbers had dropped below 100,000 as of the beginning of 2010, a 21 year low.

According to a March 9th Ministry press release, based on computerized data of Japanese border entries and exits, approximately 91,778 foreign visitors are staying illegally within the country as of January 1st, 2010. The number is down 18.8% compared with 2009, and more than 50% lower than the number in 2006 when there were an estimated 193,745 violators.

According to a report from Press Net Japan, the last time the illegal immigrant numbers were below 100,000 was back in 1989. The number had reached a peak of over 300,000 by 1993, followed with a slow decline up until the sharp fall over the past few years.

The Ministry of Justice revealed that currently, the majority of illegal immigrants have come from other Asian countries. Top offenders include Korea (23.6%), China (14.1%), and the Philippines (14.0%). Others countries listed included: Thailand, Malaysia, Peru, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. However, 25.8% of all violators were from countries not listed in the report.

The majority (68.8%) of illegal immigrants had come to Japan on short-term stay visas. The number of male offenders is only slightly that above female, at 46,324 men to 45,454 women, respectively.

News reports indicated that the recent drop in illegal immigrant numbers may be in part due an increase in border security systems, including the adoption in late 2007 of the requirement for finger prints and photos upon entry into the country. There have also reportedly been an increasing number of cases where those who have illegally stayed beyond their visa terms have left voluntarily.

In similar news, the number of cases of both entry refusals and deportations in Japan had also decreased over the past year.

http://www.examiner.com/japan-headli...an-21-year-low

2011

Why There Aren't Many Illegal Immigrants In Japan

..."There is little urban anonymity. When I first lived in Japan on a work visa and had my own apartment in a residential neighborhood of Tokyo, in 1971, I was paid a friendly visit by a local policeman. It was a completely routine matter: police are required to keep track of every resident of their beats, and they want to know the basics, such as your work, your age, and your living circumstances. In my circumstances, immigration papers were also of concern, but for Japanese, it would be the koseki, a mandatory official family record kept on a household basis, reporting births, acknowledgements of paternity, adoptions, disruptions of adoptions, deaths, marriages and divorces. Every Japanese is not just an individual, he or she is officially is a member of a household (ie), and the state keeps track."...

More... http://ukcommentators.blogspot.com/2...mmigrants.html

2006

Hard Work, Furtive Living - Illegal Immigrants in Japan

...A ski cap pulled low to conceal her wavy brown hair, Luz Martinez stands near Kawasaki Station, hoping to avoid any appearance of loitering in the busy terminal regularly staked out by Japanese immigration officials.

After 11 years of illegal work in low-paid jobs, Martinez has become adept at blending in with the crowd. She is one of an estimated 220,000 illegal migrants who live in Japan, most of them workers from China, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Latin America. ...

...Once in Japan, illegal immigrants face further barriers. Martinez, from Lima, Peru, was promised a "good job" in Japan by a friend of a friend. Although she had paid a broker $1,000, that job never materialized. With persistence, she found work packing frozen fish in Nagoya...

...Martinez has held 13 jobs in 11 years here...

more... http://www.globalenvision.org/library/3/986