Originally Posted by
AlwaysAisle
Currently Japan does not recognize dual citizenship.
According to Mainich newspaper, currently once a person reaches age 20 then a person has to choose one citizenship by age is 22. Under new law once a person reaches age of 18 then a person has to choose a citizenship by age if 20.
I am no expert in the area but has a family friend where their kids are in this situation and asked their friend who is an university law professor knowledgable in the area. According to this professor no dual citizenship is not that actively enforced law in Japan.
If the person is from a country where Japan does not have totally friendly relationship (don't want to go OMNI but you have an idea of those countries) then Japan may enforce no dual citizenship policy.
However, according to this professor many people from western Europe and the U.S. maintain dual citizenship without much problem with Japan.
Japan does not enforce this with Americans or Europeans at all. This is been the case for at least last 28 years since I’ve been here. The simple fact is they don’t know if you have dual citizenship because if you are Japanese that’s all they care about. The same with America. If you are American that’s all they care about unless you have a passport for a country that requires you to perform military service and then they frown on that. Whether it’s OK to have dual citizenship with Japan is one thing that you don’t have to spend even a millisecond worrying about if from the U.K. or America.
Last edited by mjm; Mar 20, 2018 at 8:47 pm