Daily Commentary – Wednesday February 14th, 2007 – Children Abducted To Japan

Dana discusses:

• The failure of the government of the United States to recover children abducted to Japan

2 Responses to “Daily Commentary – Wednesday February 14th, 2007 – Children Abducted To Japan”

1. LilPuma on February 14th, 2007 2:45 pm

   I’m glad to hear this topic will be discussed again on the Dana Pretzer show. I think this is something we should get together on and write a few letters to our congressmen and the State Department.

2. Mark Smith on February 16th, 2007 1:01 pm

   Excellent idea! If you would like some sample letters to start with, scroll down to the “Sample Letters” section of this webpage.

   http://www.crnjapan.com/involved/en/writeletters.html

   There are samples directed to both state and national politicians as well as President Bush, which have very specific requests depending on who the intended recipient is.

   In particular, the request I believe that has the most chance of both not causing too many political problems to make it impossible and actually doing some good, is the request to direct the State Department to add information on international parental kidnapping by Japanese and other family law abuses to the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for Japan, which is submitted on a yearly basis to Congress. The latest one is here:

   http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61610.htm

   The section on “Children” has the completely ridiculous statement that “The government [of Japan] is committed to the rights and welfare of children, and in general children’s rights were protected adequately.” And this is but one of many issues that you can read about here:

   http://www.crnjapan.com/issues/

   How they can say this when American children are being abducted to Japan and legally isolated from their American parents by the hundreds is beyond me. Japan sometimes responds to external embarassment, so getting the REAL situation described here could have an effect.

   The next most important request is to enact exit controls at US airports so that Japanese parents cannot leave on short notice with same-day travel documents that the Japanese embassy will issue any Japanese parent with an American child, regardless of court orders prohibiting them to travel out of the US with their child.

   PLEASE WRITE!!

   Mark Smith
   webmaster, Japan Children’s Rights Network
   http://www.crnjapan.com

Leave a Reply