The Supreme Court rejected claims by a South Korean woman April 10 who demanded a retraction of the government's refusal to issue her a re-entry permit after she refused to be fingerprinted.
The top court's petty bench dismissed the case of Choi Sun Ae, 38, reversing a lower court decision that partially acknowledged her claims. Choi was appealing the Fukuoka High Court's May 1994 ruling that dismissed her demands that the government reinstate her permanent resident status and pay redress.
Lawyers representing the government were also appealing the high court decision, which ordered the government to retract its earlier rejection of her application to re-enter Japan. Choi, a third-generation Korean pianist born and raised in Japan, was denied a re-entry permit in 1986 before she traveled to the United States to study music at Indiana University, on the grounds that she had refused to be fingerprinted when she renewed her alien registration in 1981 and 1986.