The Justice Ministry has granted special residential permission to a Kurdish asylum-seeker who had been waging a weeklong hunger strike with four fellow Kurds from Turkey at an immigration center in Ibaraki Prefecture, it was leaned Saturday.
Hassan Chikan, who was released from the Higashi-Nihon Immigration Center in Ushiku on Friday, is believed to be the first Kurdish asylum-seeker from Turkey to be granted resident status by the Japanese government, according to lawyers supporting immigrants. The ministry does not disclose information on individual cases.
A group of five Kurdish asylum-seekers, including Chikan, have refused all food and drink except water at the detention center from the morning of April 20 to protest the decision to deport them to Turkey.