When British incarceration inspection expert Hindpal Singh Bhui last month paid his first visit to a Japanese immigration detention center, his overriding initial impression was that it looked like a prison.
"The fact that if someone comes to visit detainees, the starting point is that you're behind a glass screen and you can't touch someone — that feels quite restrictive," Bhui, team leader for London-based Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Prisons, told The Japan Times during a recent visit to Japan.
"It's something which perhaps is a prison-style approach and which was surprising to see in immigration detention centers," Bhui said of his visit to the government facility in Ushiku, Ibaraki Prefecture.