Last year, 5,000 people applied for refugee status in Japan. 11 were accepted.
This past March, the Economist ran a headline, ¡°No entry: As the world¡¯s refugee problem grows, Japan pulls up the drawbridge.¡± The article included an image of the red circle (the sun) that is the flag symbol of Japan with a white bar through it, the symbol for ¡°Do Not Enter¡± signs in Europe. This month The Washington Post weighed in with an article headlined, ¡°As Europe makes room for refugees, some in Japan ask why not us?¡±
Japan is a strong target for refugee criticism because of its modest engagement in social media and global communications. Typically, it doesn¡¯t proactively make its case to the world, largely allowing the international press and the Twitterverse to frame its issues for it.
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