As I wrote recently in these pages, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's new Cabinet-level panel, led by Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara, will review “foreign national-related issues that warrant urgent attention and propose specific solutions by January.”
When first announced, tourists, nonresident real-estate purchasers and long-term foreign residents appeared to be lumped together. That created unnecessary concerns about a Japanese turn toward xenophobia.
That has now changed. Three task forces were established within the Liberal Democratic Party with a view to establishing cross-ministerial cooperation that has been lacking to date. The first meetings took place on Nov. 4.
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