By Malika
Over the past year, I’ve been going on weekly visits to an immigration detention center in Japan to investigate the harassment, medical neglect, discrimination, and violence by the officers. I’m writing this to shed light on the reality of forced deportations and the gross human rights violations taking place in Japan’s immigration detention centers. This is the first in a series of articles I intend to share in the future. Getting their stories out into the public is extremely vital, as their voices need to be heard. We must not continue to ignore what is happening in the detention centers in Japan. Changing a system isn’t easy but it’s possible if we all work together towards a shared goal. 

During my time there last year, I met someone whose story shows the true horrors that happen in the immigration detention centers. 

My First Impression of G

The first time I met G was 7 months ago, when he walked into the room with a cheeky grin that was even visible through his mask. Even though it was the first time we had ever met, he started chatting away as if he had known us for ages. For the next 5 months, we would meet almost every week, building a close relationship. We formed a strong connection through our shared experiences of facing discrimination and feeling isolated in Japanese society. His cocky almost child-like personality never failed to amuse me. Even when he was at his darkest, he never failed to make me laugh.
G came to Japan as a teenager, to join his parents who had already been working on a Long-Term Residency status. After arriving, G started working right away. Over the next 10 years, G found a community in Japan. With other members of the community, he continued to build a life. Unfortunately he got into some trouble and was arrested. He lost his residency status and after being released from prison, he was detained at the immigration detention center. 

The Reality of Detention

After an extremely stressful 6 months, he made the decision to go on hunger strike. Officers at the immigration centers harass the detainees on a daily basis making it impossible for them to live there. When they fight back, they’re told to “leave Japan if they don’t like it here”. The food served at the centers are cold and extremely oily. There have been cases where the fried chicken and pork were raw. The tatami in the rooms are extremely dirty and even after hours of cleaning, they still smell horrible. The shower curtains are full of mold. There are cockroaches, fleas, mites, and other kinds of insects everywhere. 

During those 6 months, he had been repeatedly verbally harassed by the officers. 2 weeks after being on a hunger strike, he was given a 2-week provisional release. During those two weeks, immigration officers visited his home to ensure that he was not working, as on a provisional release individuals are not permitted to work or even leave their registered prefecture without getting permission from the immigration authorities. On the day of the renewal, he and his parents drove hours to the Immigration Bureau. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he was called in to start the renewal process alone. Even after an hour had passed since he went in, he had not returned. It soon became clear that he had been re-detained. His mother immediately burst into tears. G had no idea that his provisional release would not be extended so he hadn’t even brought any spare clothes to spend the night. G’s case had been irregular from the start. He had been told to come to an immigration center far from his house for renewal, even though most individuals are permitted to go to their nearest immigration center for it. This made a lot of us suspect that immigration was planning to forcefully re-detain and deport him.

Suddenly Re-detained

The same day he was detained, we requested to see him inside but were denied as he was “being processed”. His parents, who had come a very long way, were also denied visitation. They bought a toothbrush, toothpaste, detergent, and some other daily necessities for him and left. As it was a Friday, the next time we could request to see him was the following Monday. On Monday, just before 11 am we requested to see G but we were denied again. This time however, not only were we not allowed to see him, but we were also denied the request to send him a letter. This was extremely odd. In my 8 months of weekly visits to the detention center, this had never happened before. We grew alarmingly concerned over the fact that we were denied all requests to communicate with him.

After discussing the situation together, we started to suspect that he might have been forcefully deported. By Tuesday, his family and friends grew more concerned over the fact that nobody had been able to contact him. At this point, we were almost certain that he had been deported. He had been saying that if he were ever taken to the airport to be deported, he would fight back. He would refuse to be picked up and thrown on an airplane like an object. Then the news came. On Wednesday, G’s friend got a call from him, saying he had been deported. The immigration authorities denied visitation requests from his parents that day, knowing that he was redetained to be deported the following Monday. He was deported without even being allowed to say goodbye to his parents.

The Deportation

At 8 am, G was called out of his room. As he stepped out, 8 officers grabbed and forced him into a different room, where he was handcuffed and his body tied with a rope. At 12 pm, they tried to force him onto the bus, but he resisted. Normally, the officer with a camera would film from the front, but he filmed from the back to hide the gravity of the situation. After he was forced onto the bus, G kept resisting and yelled at them to stop, as they were hurting him but they continued to ignore him, so he spat on them. This led to him being physically assaulted by one of the officers. He called for the police, but was refused. He was then forced to sit up right on the seat, with one officer restraining his head from the back and another holding his legs at the front, making him completely immobile. The bus reached the airport at around 1 pm, where he was given the choice to stay silent and have the handcuffs removed, or continue resisting. He stopped resisting, as he had not eaten anything since being re-detained, and had no energy to continue.

The Racist Deportation Regime 

G is not the only person to have faced this reality. From late last year, the number of forced deportations have spiked. They’re all done in the exact same way. The person is handcuffed and taken away by multiple officers early in the morning. Family members are never told beforehand. The first time they are made aware of the deportation is when the person calls them from the country they’ve been deported to. For refugees, this is essentially a death sentence. As Japan has an extremely low refugee acceptance rate, many people have been handed this fate. The Japanese government will continue to have blood on their hands if action isn’t taken. Moreover, for others like G, their lives are suddenly turned upside down. Everything they have built in Japan is taken away from them in a matter of seconds, and their families and friends are left behind feeling helpless and devastated. 
Regardless of being a refugee or not, being tied up and transported merely like an object is extremely inhumane. You are stripped of any and all dignity and bodily autonomy. There’s been a case where a person died while resisting deportation. There have also been multiple cases where an individual fought back on the airplane and the pilot refused to take off, until they were removed from the aircraft and the deportation was canceled. This kind of treatment causes detrimental long-lasting psychological issues and should never be accepted or tolerated, or even worse endorsed and ordered by the government. This outright racism sends out a clear message: people with foreign backgrounds are mere objects that can be used and disposed of. They don’t have any human rights. They can be monitored, controlled, and eventually deported regardless of their situation if the government finds no use for them anymore. 

JOIN US!

There is a lot more that needs to be done and can be done. Join us in the fight against forced deportations and the racist and oppressive immigration system. Come with us to the detention center to get the voices out there. Help us with publishing stories and translating in person and for fliers etc. There is power in numbers. Join us every week outside parliament from 6pm on Fridays to raise our voice against unjust deportations. Let’s come together and fight for social justice!