Hello there,

Sorry to get all political on you but it affects us all in a way. Let's try to avoid an Orwellian Society but clinging to what humans rights we still have.

The Japanese Government is about to start enforcing compulsory fingerprinting on all foreigners at border control from the end of this month. Any foreign national entering Japan will be subject to a bio-electronic fingerprint scan and that information will be stored and accessible by the police and various ministries as they see fit.

The problem is this programme is being introduced in the name of "Anti-Terrorism" (you folk in the states may have heard this line already no doubt).

I do not believe that it is fair to subject only foreigners to this kind of treatment. Some of us, me included, have been living here for much of our lives. We pay taxes, we support the economy. I have even worked for Japanese companies for the last 7 years for goodness sakes. To enforce fingerprinting upon upstanding foreign citizens like this is truly a personal insult and a breach of basic human rights. If they wanted to keep tabs on potential terrorist activity, why not fingerprint everybody?

I know this doesn't concern many of you who live overseas, but one day I am sure many of you would like to come and visit this beautiful and enchanting country. You too could end up being fingerprinted and photographed at immigration. Also, if USA and Japan can get away with it, what is to stop Governments in your country from fingerprinting you in the near future?

I plead with you to spread the news and at least to sign the petition below. At the time of writing, they have collected only 1,484 signatures and will need much more to have any kind of impact. I hope you can spend 2 minutes to add a few more!

The petition: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/fingerprints-japan/

The policy: http://nettv.gov-online.go.jp/prg/prg1431.html

The news: http://www.japantoday.com/jp/comment/1177