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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| U.S. Deserter Wants Japanese Citizenship |
| 2004-12-08 |
| U.S. Army deserter Charles Jenkins, settling in northern Japan after his release from a military prison and four decades in North Korea, has expressed hopes of becoming a Japanese citizen, a newspaper reported Wednesday. The Asahi newspaper said Jenkins, who abandoned his Army unit in 1965 and defected to North Korea, would soon apply for permanent residency in Japan on the remote island of Sado, where he arrived on Tuesday. Jenkins' wife, Hitomi Soga, is Japanese, and their two North Korean-born daughters, Mika, 21, and Brinda, 19, received Japanese citizenship soon after their arrival in Japan in July. The North Carolina-native, who served 25 days in a U.S. military jail after being convicted of desertion, said Tuesday that he would like to spend the rest of his life in Japan, but he did not publicly mention the possibility of Japanese citizenship. No skin off my fore. Just keep him out of the U.S.A. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #3 Actually, you can become a naturalized Japanese citizen. It is most commonly done by Koreans (some but not all have been there for generations, anyway), Chinese, etc, but there are those from Western countries who do so: Konishiki and Akebono to name some prominent former Americans that I can recall. Finally, there was a Finnish guy who not only naturalized, but got elected to local office (this was in the mid to late 90s; not sure if he is still in office) |
| Posted by: Carl in N.H. 2004-12-08 11:52:01 PM |
| #2 Japanese citizenship...ha! The Japanese don't let anyone naturalize. It disturbs the "wa", don't you understand. You can live there 40 years and still be an outsider. Still, if anyone has a chance, it's Jenkins. I don't know how the Japanese feel about making him one of their own, though. They might feel he's better off as an American. |
| Posted by: gromky 2004-12-08 7:25:20 PM |
| #1 Let 'em keep the bastard. |
| Posted by: BigEd 2004-12-08 1:44:15 PM |