Submission from Norma Kang Muico, Amnesty
International
I am following up on the request made by one
of the Foreign Affairs Committee's Members during my oral evidence
session at the House of Commons on "Global Security: Japan
and Korea" held on 2 April 2008.
Although I was not able to find statistics on
the number of people who are or have been held in the daiyo kangoku
or substitute prison system for 23 days without access to a lawyer,
I found relevant data, which the Committee may find equally useful.
Please find attached data[13]
on the average number of days prisoners in Japan are incarcerated
in the daiyo kangoku system. The figures indicate that the average
number of days of pre-trial detention from 1998-2004 exceeds 23
days. Makoto Teranaka, Director of Amnesty International Japan,
explained that if after 23 days, there is still no available space
at a detention centre, then a detainee could continue to be held
at the substitute prison. He said that this is more likely to
happen in rural areas where the space at detention centres is
quite limited.
I hope the Foreign Affairs Committee's mission
to Japan and South Korea in May will be a successful one.
14 April 2008
13 The information is in Japanese and from the Japanese
National Policy Agency's Department of Statistics on 6 December
2005. The English translation has been done by Amnesty International. Back
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