North Korea runs schools in Japan

[Twoller]

This is an interesting article that introduced some bits of life in Japan with regards to immigration and the presence of foreigners in Japanese society.

Tuition plan ban on Korea schools eyed

Nakai wants to link subsidies to abductions

Kyodo News

Hiroshi Nakai, minister in charge of the abduction issue, has asked education minister Tatsuo Kawabata to bar schools that cater to the children of residents with ethnic ties to North Korea from the planned tuition-free subsidy program, government sources said.

As a result of Nakai's request, Kawabata and other lawmakers in charge of education have opened formal deliberations on "chosen gakko," or North Korean schools, the sources said.

When the new academic year begins in April, the government will scrap tuition for public high schools and provide a per-student subsidy of ¥120,000 a year to families whose children attend private high schools, including those institutions catering to foreign students.

According to the education ministry, there are 73 chosen gakko across Japan whose educational activities are authorized by prefectural governments.

Twelve of them are the equivalent of high schools and called "kokyu gakko." All 73 are operated in close collaboration with Chongryon, a pro-Pyongyang organization also known as the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan.

Nakai apparently wants the exemption put in place to demonstrate Japan's firm stance on the abduction issue to get Pyongyang to finally account for the fate of Japanese nationals who were spirited away by North Korean agents in the past, the sources said.

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There is more to the article at this link:

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-b...0100222a2.html