Japan treated like a criminal

by Peter Titze

There always has been a certain amount of suspicion towards foreigners in Japan but what I experimented on my recent arrival at Tokyo's Narita airport is outrages.

 Every arriving foreigner is photographed and finger printed. Apparently this procedure is now in force at all Japanese international airports. It will probably not net many criminals but certainly will cause substantial damage to the Japanese tourism industry. As far as I am concerned I will not go back there as long as this is force.

Also it lengthens the immigration procedure. On my arrival there was only a rather small line but I still had to wait almost half an hour to get through since this picture taking and fingerprinting is slowing down the process.