Let's Japan.org Debunking Eikaiwa and Ramblings in Japan

For the life of me, I cannot wrap my head around why Kim Hyon Hui is in Japan. She blows up KAL flight 858 in 1987, killing all aboard, is arrested, sentenced to death, pardoned, marries one of her bodyguards, writes a book about her days as a spy, and now leads a presumably comfortable but secluded life in South Korea. But because she met some of the Japanese abductees, Japan has seen fit to let her into the country despite her crimes where she has been kicking back at Yukio's summer pad in Karuizawa and is slated to take a helicopter tour of Mt. Fuji today. What the hell?

Unless she has a photographic memory or has extensively traveled to North Korea in recent years, Kim hasn't been a source of information for a very long time. Anything she knows about the abductees is over 20 years old now. She may have some comforting words to say to the Iizukas or Yokotas but that's about it. Sure enough, Shigeru Yokota, father of Megumi, said as much:

北朝鮮による拉致被害者・横田めぐみさんの両親の滋さんと早紀江さんは２２日朝、長野県軽井沢町で記者会見を開き、来日中の大韓航空機爆破事件実行犯の金賢姫（キム・ヒョンヒ）元死刑囚との面会した結果について、

滋さんによると、金元死刑囚はめぐみさんの写真は何度か見たことはあるが、会ったのは１度だけだと話したという。早紀江さんは「めぐみと近しいところにいた金さんと会えて、夢のようだった」と話し、金元死刑囚にベージュ色の上着をお土産としてプレゼントしたと話した。

Kim had nothing to offer that he hasn't already heard. Moreover, she only met Megumi once. But that hasn't stopped Prime Minister Naoto Kan from saying that he hopes Kim's visit will help resolve the abductee issue. Really? If this is Japan's idea of a diplomatic gesture, then its efforts to bring some sort of closure to the abductee issue are truly dead in the water. Let's have bread and circuses instead. After watching the coverage on TV, the one thing that sticks in my mind is this: Why is Japan pallin' around with a terrorist?

*I can't believe I quoted Sarah Palin. I feel dirty, but this visit by Kim doesn't make any sense to me.

As you may know, Japan will start collecting biometric data for all foreigners coming into Japan as of November 20 under the guise of the fictitious War on Terror. How very curious that fingerprinting was done away with years ago only to be brought back with the excuse that it will protect Japan from terrorists. Just to make sure everyone knows what a threat foreigners are to Japan, Justice minister, Kunio Hatoyama, recently told the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Tokyo that he knew of a friend of a friend who was an Al Qaeda member.

Via Debito's blog, we learn that by November this year, all visitors to Japan will be fingerprinted and photographed in the name of protecting Japan's security. Watch the cheesy video in English here.