Japan yesterday enacted a law meant to promote understanding of the LGBT community that critics said provides no human rights guarantees, while some conservative lawmakers said the measure is too permissive.
Japan, the only G7 nation that does not have legal protection for same-sex unions, had originally pledged to pass the law before hosting a G7 summit last month.
However, wrangling over the bill meant it was only submitted to parliament for consideration on May 18, the day before the summit began.
Photo: Reuters
The initial draft stipulated that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity should “not be tolerated,” but was changed to “there should be no unfair discrimination,” which critics have said tacitly encourages some forms of discrimination.
Despite the bill being watered down, some members of Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party broke ranks with party directives, boycotting or walking out of a vote on Tuesday in the Japanese House of Representatives and the final vote in the Japanese House of Councilors.
“There have been crimes committed by impersonators in women’s restrooms,” former Japanese House of Councilors president Akiko Santo said after boycotting the vote in that chamber. “It would be a very serious problem if this bill passed and the trend became that it was normal to accept anything.”
Japan has come under pressure from other G7 nations, especially the US, to allow same-sex marriage.
Business leaders have said they fear Japan will not be able to remain internationally competitive without greater diversity, including representation for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people — especially as Tokyo seeks to promote itself as a global financial center.
“As a financial institution, in order to achieve sustainable growth, it is essential to create an environment in which people with diverse backgrounds and values can play an active role,” Japan Bankers Association chairperson and Mizuho Bank president Masahiko Kato told a news conference this week.
The Japanese public broadly supports same-sex marriage, opinion polls have shown, while local governments in most of the country allow same-sex partnership agreements that fall short of the rights guaranteed by marriage.
“Some 70 percent of the nation allows same-sex partnerships, and surveys have found more than 70 percent of people are in favor of same-sex marriage,” activist group Marriage for All Japan wrote on Twitter after the bill passed.
“Even business leaders are on our side. Now, parliament and the government must move,” it said.
Kishida in February sacked an aide who had sparked outrage by saying people would flee Japan if same-sex marriage was allowed, and that he did not want to live next to LGBT couples.
However, Kishida has remained noncommittal on same-sex marriage, saying circumstances in each nation are different and discussion had to proceed “carefully.”
In five court cases on same-sex marriage over the past two years, four courts ruled either that not allowing it was unconstitutional or nearly so. One said not allowing it was in line with the constitution.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver