On Feb. 24, the Japan Kurdish Cultural Association (JKCA) was scheduled to hold a concert with a Kurdish singer at the Saitama Kaikan in Saitama Prefecture, but it was cancelled the day before. According to the Saitama Shimbun, the reason for the cancellation was that the singer, Seyda Perinçek, was refused entry to Japan at Narita Airport and had to fly back to Germany, where he lives. The immigration officer who dealt with the matter said that Perinçek did not have the proper visa. According to the JKCA, Perinçek and his entourage had gone to the Japanese embassy in Germany before leaving Germany and were told that he didn’t need a visa since he was a legal resident of Germany and anyone with German travel documents did not need a visa to enter Japan. 

The likely reason for the Narita immigration officer’s refusal to allow Perinçek entry is that, since he was coming to Japan in order to perform, he would have needed a special work visa, but the JKCA told the newspaper that Perinçek had been told by the Japanese embassy in Germany that he could travel to Japan for the purpose of singing at a concert, so it’s not clear what the problem was and who could be blamed for it. The association said it would look into the matter more fully.

The Perinçek affair was also covered in the Feb. 28 edition of the Sankei Shimbun, the conservative daily that has made a point of covering the “Kurdish problem” more thoroughly than other newspapers, usually in a way that looks negatively upon the Kurdish presence in Japan. Sankei said that the Perinçek matter was discussed during a lower house budget committee meeting the previous day, when the justice minister, Keisuke Suzuki, was asked by a lawmaker whose constituency is Kawaguchi in Saitama Prefecture, a city that contains a lot of Kurdish immigrants, if Perinçek had been refused entry because he didn’t have the proper visa. Suzuki said that was indeed the case, and the lawmaker then asked if some mistake had been made. Suzuki denied that there was anything improper about the immigration process for Perinçek. 

The lawmaker, Hideaki Takahashi of the Nippon Ishin Party, was not trying to put the ministry on the spot. On the contrary, he appeared to be fishing for an excuse to complain about the Kurds in his bailiwick, and used the occasion of the Perinçek matter to comment that the singer was a “member of the PKK, the Kurdish Labor Party,” which has been designated as a terrorist organization in Turkey. That’s why Perinçek defected to Germany. Takahashi said that Japan has good relations with Turkey, so is that the reason why Perinçek was denied entry? Suzuki replied that he was not at liberty to comment on “an individual case.” Takahashi later said that he hoped there would be “more questions about Kurds in Japan” during this Diet session, thus implying that more should be done about the so-called Kurdish problem. 

An earlier Sankei report about the Perinçek concert quoted the foundation that runs the public halls in Saitama Prefecture as saying that it was “difficult” to make a decision about whether or not to rent Saitama Kaikan to the JKCA because it didn’t know if the Japanese government believes that the JKCA supports a “terrorist organization.” The Sankei says that the Turkish government told Japan that the association and Perinçek belong to the PKK, whose assets are frozen in Turkey. 

The only media outlet that seems to have covered the other side of the matter is the web program No Hate TV, whose host, Yasumichi Noma, said during a recent broadcast that negative coverage of the concert on social media sites by anti-Kurd elements during the week or so before Perinçek’s arrival led to Saitama Kaikan receiving about 50 calls a day to call off the concert. The hall decided to hold it anyway, so Noma wonders if the government figured out another way to get the concert cancelled. 

Noma also talked about Perinçek. He is a Kurdish refugee, just like most of the Kurds in Kawaguchi, who came to Japan because they say they are unfairly persecuted by the Turkish authorities and would be in danger if they were forced to return. But the Japanese government refuses to recognize them as refugees. Germany issues travel documents to refugees, as mentioned above, even during the phase when resident status is being determined. However, in order to enter Japan, someone from Germany with refugee status must obtain a visa, and that is why Perinçek went to the Japanese embassy beforehand. According to the JKCA, he told the embassy that he wanted to perform in Japan and they issued him a regular tourist visa, saying that it would be sufficient. He didn’t question this decision because he had performed in other countries, including the U.S., after becoming a refugee with only a tourist visa, so he didn’t think it would be a problem in Japan. But the immigration officer at Narita said it was a problem. Also, the JKCA has held this concert in previous years with other Kurdish musicians and there was never any problem. 

As for Takahashi, freelance journalist Koichi Yasuda, who has covered Kurdish refugees extensively, said on No Hate TV, that he is constantly saying in the Diet that the Kurds in Kawaguchi are “causing problems,” so there may be some connection with the cancelled concert. The PKK has reportedly negotiated some kind of settlement with the Turkish government, though it isn’t clear if the settlement means the party is no longer considered a terrorist organization by the Turkish administration. In any event, it doesn’t seem to make any difference one way or the other to the Japanese government, which would just prefer the Kurdish refugees get out of Japan.