The 42-year-old Kurdish asylum seeker’s wife and four children fled back to Turkey more than a year ago, terrified about the radioactive fallout from the Fukushima nuclear crisis, but he stayed on, in limbo, hoping beyond hope that he would be permitted to remain in Japan.
The man, who was living in Saitama Prefecture and asked that his name be withheld to protect his privacy, is not allowed to work and doesn’t qualify for health insurance as the government has rejected his four previous applications for refugee status.
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