Police crackdown targets illegal foreign workers

The National Police Agency and the Justice and Labor ministries will crack down on foreigners working illegally in Japan amid the financial crisis in Asia, the three bodies' bureau chiefs decided at a meeting March 12.

Police and officials from immigration and labor standards will join forces nationwide to handle illegal foreign workers, labor brokers and underground groups that smuggle foreigners into Japan, they said. They will also address underworld banks that help foreigners launder money or illegally remit it abroad, they said.

The three agencies plan to link their local prefectural offices and employers' group into a regional cooperative body to provide information to employers about proper hiring of foreigners, they said. The meeting was attended by Okiharu Date and Toshinori Kanemoto, chiefs of the NPA's Securities and International bureaus, and Shigeo Takenaka of the Justice Ministry's Immigration Bureau.

Takenaka called for joint action against foreigners working without proper visas, pointing to an increase in the number of such workers involved in crimes, the sources said. The number of illegal foreigners has been falling since 1993, but totaled around 276,000 as of January, according to the NPA and Justice Ministry.