Japan calls the US president’s comments “regrettable” while India says it is open to immigrants.
India and Japan have rejected President Joe Biden’s comments in which he called US allies “xenophobic” countries that do not welcome immigrants and equated the two nations with China and Russia.
India’s Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said the country has always been open to immigrants and has a strong economic base, the Economic Times newspaper reported on Saturday.
“First, our economy is not faltering,” Jaishankar said Friday at a roundtable hosted by the Economic Times after Biden said the four nations were failing to reap the economic benefits of migration.
“I think we should be open to people who feel the need to come to India, who have a right to come to India,” Jaishankar added, referring to a controversial citizenship law that speeds up the naturalization of some non-Muslim immigrants .
Japan, which has the lowest immigrant population of any G7 (Group of Seven) country at less than 2 percent, also criticized the US president’s comments at his embassy in Washington, DC, calling them “regrettable” and “not based on facts.” “. an accurate understanding of Japanese politics.”
“They don’t want immigrants”
At a recent campaign fundraiser, Biden criticized countries for accepting fewer migrants while arguing that migration has strengthened the U.S. economy.
“Why is China faltering so much economically, why is Japan having problems, why Russia, why India, because they’re xenophobic. “They don’t want immigrants,” Biden said at the event marking the start of the month on Asian American heritage , Hawaiian and Pacific Islander marked.
“One of the reasons our economy is growing is because of you and many others. Why? Because we welcome immigrants.”
The president’s highlighting of Japan and India came as a surprise given his emphasis on strengthening ties with the two nations since taking office in 2021.
Last year, Biden welcomed Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the White House, where he praised the two countries’ shared “democratic character” and “diversity.”
In April, he hosted Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at a state dinner where he celebrated the “unbreakable” partnership between the United States and Japan and their commitment to “democracy and freedom.”
In a statement cited by US media on Friday, the Japanese embassy said it had raised the issue with government officials.
It also said it was “aware” that the administration had made clear that Biden’s comments were intended to highlight the role of immigrants in strengthening the United States, “and that his comment was not made with the intent to reflect the importance and “To undermine Japan’s stability.” US relationship”.
The controversy will not affect Japan’s future cooperation with the United States, it said.
The White House then tried to downplay the comments. It said the president is “going above and beyond” to highlight U.S. diversity and stressed that “our allies know very well how much the president respects them.”
Japan, despite its historically strict immigration policies, is slowly opening its doors to outsiders to compensate for its rapidly aging population.
India, the world’s most populous country, has been criticized for its move to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act of 2019, which expedites the naturalization of non-Muslims from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan.
While the law makes the migration process easier for some asylum seekers, critics say it discriminates against Muslims and is unconstitutional.