The Diet last month enacted a law to prevent discriminatory treatment of disabled people. It not only prohibits such treatment but also legally obligates the central and local governments and other public organizations to take necessary measures to remove obstacles that disabled people face.
It also calls on private organizations such as businesses and social welfare service corporations to make efforts to take such measures. The enactment of the law, which goes into effect in April 2016, means that Japan has established the domestic legal foundation necessary for Japan's ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
More than 130 countries and regions have already ratified it. It is hoped that the law will help Japanese society remove the obstacles that disabled people are facing, thus helping to create a society that eases the daily burdens on such people.