It's no secret that Japan discourages asylum-seekers, though officials never admit to it openly. When asked what the government would do about the 10 North Korean refugees who entered the Japanese Embassy in Bangkok on July 31, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said that it would be better for them to go to South Korea. "If they came to Japan, they probably couldn't make a living," he said.

In other words, they would be subject to institutional and social discrimination. By that token presumably the only asylum-seekers who could fit in here are those with Japanese blood, like Alberto Fujimori, the disgraced former president of Peru. Though Fujimori is not officially a refugee, the circumstances of his arrival and residence, as well as the position of the government with regard to Lima's request for his extradition to stand trial in Peru, have all the hallmarks of a political asylum case.

If the local media has failed to point this out, it's because they buy the government's claim that Fujimori is a Japanese citizen and thus cannot be extradited to Peru. After arriving in Japan in November 2000, Fujimori resigned as Peru's president, by fax. The Peruvian government rejected the resignation and deposed him, and then set about making a criminal case against him for corruption and human rights violations. In December 2000, Japan's Justice Ministry announced they had "confirmed" that Fujimori is, in fact, a Japanese citizen because his name had been entered into a family register (koseki) in Kumamoto when he was born in Peru in 1938 to Japanese immigrants. Lima contested this sudden decision to grant citizenship. Japan countered that it did not "grant" anything, because owing to the koseki system Fujimori has "always been a Japanese citizen."