More Thais denied entry to Japan despite visa waiver

Sankei Shimbun revealed that though the number of Thai visitors last year rose by 43 per cent to 681,743 since the waiver was introduced in July 2013, as many as 4,391 of them ended up being arrested for overstaying. Under the new visa rules, Thai citizens are allowed a 15-day visa-free visit. 

As for refusal of entry, the most common reason provided was “doubts over travellers’ stated purpose of entry”.

Sankei noted that last year, 91 Thai nationals were also charged with violating the Refugee Act, more than double the figure for 2013. A high-ranking police officer was quoted as saying that he believed this figure was “just the tip of the iceberg”. 

Japan aims to attract more foreign tourists as part of its economic strategy, with a targeted goal of around 20 million visitors per year by 2020. To achieve this, it has been selectively adopting visa-waiver schemes for Asean countries, particularly Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. 

Recently, Sankei covered an early-morning raid on a location in Ibaraki prefecture that had been monitored for three months by immigration authorities after a tip about “illegal foreign overstayers” living there. The building’s windows were blackened to prevent outsiders from looking in. 

The area around the building was strewn with a “mountain” of abandoned industrial equipment.  After waiting for a while, inspectors confronted a Thai man as he emerged from the building, and upon entering the facility they found another Thai man and woman. All three of them confessed that they had entered Japan last November on a 15-day visa. 

“They got in by samen,” the inspector murmured. Samen is immigration shorthand for sasho-menjo or visa waiver.

The three also admitted to having overstayed and engaging in work without permission. While being taken to the Tokyo Immigration Department, the Thai woman, 39, told an inspector in reasonably good Japanese that she had arrived from Bangkok on a flight to Nagoya. 

“We took the Shinkansen [bullet train] and came here [to Ibaraki],” she said. This was her third visit to Japan, and she had paid 800,000 yen (about Bt220,000) to a broker, who used the money to buy her an air ticket and arrange for work. She has been earning 5,000 yen per day working in the fields harvesting vegetables. 

While the wage may seem low, an official said illegal workers could earn enough in two or three years to build a house back home. “So they borrow money to come here,” he explained with a shrug.

The woman, who had left two children back at home, said: “I like Japan. Guess I won’t be able to come any more.” 

The number of Thais working illegally in Japan appears to be on the rise. Last year the Tokyo Metropoli-tan Police Department arrested 139 Thais, up by 36 per cent from 2013. As more business operators try to exploit the no-visa loophole, the authorities are likely to respond with tougher crackdowns.