“Hotel operators in Tokyo have been slow to respond to the calls from the Japanese and Tokyo metropolitan governments to step up the introduction of barrier-free guest rooms ahead of the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics in the Japanese capital, leading to complaints by some wheelchair users that there are not enough rooms they can use. Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku, central Tokyo, is one exception.”
“A remark made by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a Group of 20 dinner that the installation of elevators at Osaka Castle was a “big mistake” has been criticized as lacking consideration for disabled people and especially inappropriate ahead of the Tokyo Paralympics next year.”
“A man temporarily arrested on suspicion of confining his eldest son, who has severe intellectual disabilities, has expressed mixed feelings about the incident in an interview with the Mainichi Shimbun.”
“A total of 66.3 percent of people with illnesses or disabilities in Japan said they have difficulties balancing work and treatment or working with their handicaps, a government report showed Tuesday, indicating a lack of workplace support for them.”
“An increasing number of prefectural governments and ordinance-designated major cities in Japan are expanding the scope of disabled people qualified to take exams for regular jobs at the public-sector offices to include those with mental or intellectual disabilities. Previously, the job exams had been available to people with physical disabilities.”
“With the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games fast approaching, Japanese broadcaster NHK has revealed a “four pledge” goal to provide their audience with high-quality services that would help shape the future of the public media of 2020 and beyond.”
“Taking a cue from soaring world prices for vanilla, a farm in Okinawa has started cultivating the valuable spice in an initiative aimed at boosting employment of disabled and low-income workers in Japan’s southernmost prefecture.”
“All Nippon Airways Co. will start accepting online ticket reservations from people with disabilities, dropping the requirement that they notify the airline of their assistance needs by phone or email, people close to the matter said.”
“Although Osaka Castle was mostly destroyed by fire due to chaos caused by the Meiji Restoration 150 years ago, the tenshukaku (the tallest tower) was faithfully restored about 90 years ago to how it was in the 16th century,” Abe said at the dinner he hosted Friday as chairman of the G-20 summit in Osaka. “But they made only one big mistake — they went so far as to install elevators.”
“Thousands of men and women in Japan who were forcibly sterilised are to receive compensation from the government, decades after they became victims of a eugenics law designed to prevent the birth of so-called inferior children. In April, MPs passed a bill that will compensate 25,000 people who were sterilised from 1948 until the law was abolished in 1996. They include 16,500 people who were operated on against their will.”
Barrier Free Japan