Japan
says it must look after its own before allowing Syrian refugees in
Prime
minister Shinzo Abe rejects criticism of a policy that has seen only
11 people given asylum in the past year
Justin McCurry in
Tokyo
Wednesday 30
September 2015 05.59 BST
Japan must improve
the living standards of its own people before it can consider
accepting Syrian refugees, the prime minister, Shinzo Abe said, as he
announced $1.6 billion in new assistance for Syrians and Iraqis
caught up in conflicts in the Middle East.
Japan takes no
Syrian refugees yet despite giving $200m to help fight Isis
Read more
Abe’s consistent
refusal to consider allowing even a modest number of refugees to
relocate to Japan has prompted criticism of the country’s strict
policy on asylum: last year it received a record 5,000 applications
but accepted just 11 people.
Speaking at the UN
general assembly in New York, Abe insisted Japan must first tackle
crises posed by its falling birth rate and an ageing population, and
continue its push to boost the number of women in the labour market.
“It is an issue of
demography,” Abe told reporters after his speech to the UN general
assembly. “I would say that before accepting immigrants or
refugees, we need to have more activities by women, elderly people
and we must raise our birth rate. There are many things that we
should do before accepting immigrants.”
Abe added Japan,
which is pushing for a permanent seat on the UN security council,
would “discharge our own responsibility” in addressing the causes
of the refugee crisis.
“Japan would like
to contribute by changing the conditions that give rise to refugees.
The cause of this tragedy is the fear of violence and terrorism, and
terror of poverty. The world must cooperate in order for them to find
a way to escape poverty.”
Japan’s latest aid
package includes $810m for refugees and internally displaced people
fleeing fighting in Syria and Iraq – three times the amount it
provided last year – and $750m to fund peace-building efforts in
the Middle East and Africa.
Human rights groups
have highlighted the fact Japan and other high-income countries such
as Russia, Singapore and South Korea, have failed to help relieve the
pressure on countries in the Middle East and Europe, as they struggle
to cope with the influx of people caught up in the world’s worst
refugee crisis since the second word war.
Japan, however, has
pointed to its record on providing aid to refugees: last year it
contributed $181.6m to the UN refugee agency, second only to the US.
But it has not
matched its financial largesse with pledged to accommodate Syrian and
other refugees.
Of 60 Syrians
already living in Japan who applied for refugee status, three have
been successful and another 30 or so have been given permission to
stay long-term for humanitarian reasons, according to the Japan
association for refugees.
While he did not
mention any country by name, the EU council president, Donald Tusk,
appeared to round on the “hypocrisy” of Gulf states criticising
European nations for not taking in enough refugees, while refusing to
accept any themselves.
“Many countries
represented here deal with this problem in a much simpler way; namely
by not allowing migrants and refugees to enter their territories at
all,” Tusk said in New York.
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