Small Japan border easing stirs hope, worry for foreigners

By MARI YAMAGUCHI
Associated Press

TOKYO (AP) — Japan this week will ease its much criticized coronavirus border controls, but the new policy only allows 5,000 new entrants per day, up from 3,500, including Japanese nationals, beginning March 1. The move gives a glimmer of hope for an estimated half million scholars, students, accredited workers and business travelers who have been waiting to get in for nearly two years. But many will face several more months of waiting. Jommy Kwok from Hong Kong, whose online-only first year of post-graduate study in Japan is nearly over, feels left out and hopes to arrive before the April start of the new school year so she can catch up.