Taiwan-Japan relations received a boost yesterday after the Japanese Diet voted unanimously to make permanent the current visa-free status for Taiwanese travelers.
A bill granting the special status for Taiwanese tourists was passed by the House of Councilors -- the upper house of Japan's Diet -- early yesterday, after having been approved by the House of Representatives on Tuesday.
According to a statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the permanent visa waiver will take effect on Sept. 26 -- the day the current temporary visa waiver is set to expire.
Taiwanese travelers will be allowed to stay for up to 90 days in Japan without requiring a visa.
Japan is one of the top destinations for business travelers and vacationers from Taiwan, and nearly 1 million Taiwanese visit the country each year, according to statistics supplied by the Central News Agency (CNA).
Japan currently grants visa-free entry to citizens from 62 countries.
THANKS
The move was welcomed by Taiwanese officials, who praised Japan for demonstrating its support for Taiwan despite heavy opposition from Beijing.
Chinese officials have regularly lambasted Tokyo over the visa waivers, which were first granted for Taiwanese tourists on March 25 as part of a tourism campaign for the 2005 World Exposition in Aichi Prefecture.
Beijing wanted Japan to grant visa-free status to Chinese citizens, arguing that Tokyo could not negotiate with Taipei over the issue because of the "one China" policy.
However, the Diet refused to consider the Chinese requests, citing frequent problems with illegal immigrants and criminal activity by Chinese nationals.
MOFA spokesman Michel Lu (呂慶龍) urged people in Taiwan to "cherish" their "hard-earned preferential treatment," also cautioning them to obey the law and behave appropriately while in Japan.
The nation's top representative to Japan, Koh Sei-kai (許世凱), also lauded the move, saying that dropping visa requirements was a move calculated to promote the interests of Taiwan and Japan.
Koh said that he hoped the bill was the precursor to "increased bilateral engagement" between Taiwan and Japan, saying that the current method of conducting relations was obsolete.
Japan ended formal recognition of the Republic of China in 1972, establishing a non-official organization, the Interchange Association, to act as its de facto embassy in Taipei. Taiwan also maintains a de facto embassy with an ambiguous title in Tokyo, called the Association of East Asian Relations.
TOURISM CAMPAIGN
The move by Japan to relax visa requirements for Taiwanese tourists is part of a tourism promotion campaign that began in 2002, titled "Yokoso! Japan."
"Yokoso" is Japanese vernacular for "welcome."
The campaign, which is run by a group called the Visit Japan Campaign Headquarters -- an association of government and tourism-association officials, is designed to attract 10 million visitors -- almost double the annual number of foreign tourists -- to Japan by the year 2010.
Taiwan is Japan's second-largest source of foreign tourists.
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