TOKYO: Can't get along with them; can't get along without them.

Japan's ambivalent attitude to foreigners will probably prevent the country from welcoming an influx of immigrants that business leaders say could revitalize the economy and stave off a population crisis.

The population of the world's second largest economy is ageing faster than that of any other developed nation, as a result of increasing life expectancy and a low birthrate. If current trends continue, the number of Japanese will peak at nearly 128 million in 2006 and fall to nearly half that in a century.

"Let's aim for an active and attractive Japan that foreigners will want to visit, live and work in, or invest in," the Japanese business federation Nippon Keidanren suggested in a paper issued earlier this year.

But near-daily media reports of crimes by foreigners, or people who "appear to be foreign, " are a sign that there is scant chance of the Japanese embracing immigration.

Japan has long been reluctant to dilute what many of its people see as a homogeneous cultural identity - cutting itself off from the outside world almost completely for 200 years until the mid-19th century.

More recently, Japanese politicians have been making capital out of blaming the nation's woes on outsiders, particularly those from other Asian countries.

"This is an appalling time in terms of the Japanese attitude to foreigners," said Immigration Bureau Chief Hidenori Sakanaka at a recent Tokyo symposium on the possibility of Japan becoming a multiethnic society.

Sakanaka says mass immigration without a fundamental change in attitudes could lead to racial violence.

Pointing the finger

Earlier this month, Shigefumi Matsuzawa, governor of Kanagawa Prefecture near Tokyo, attracted little criticism for referring to foreigners as "thieves" in a general election campaign speech.

Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara's frequent pronouncements against foreigners have likewise done nothing to damage his nationwide popularity. In 2000, he warned Japanese troops to be ready to round up rioting illegal immigrants in the event of an earthquake.

Illegal aliens are not the only targets of suspicion.

The government has launched a campaign to boost the economy by doubling the number of foreign tourists to 10 million a year, but a November opinion poll showed a third of Japanese were against it. Almost all of those opposed said they feared a rise in crime.

"These are frightening results. The fact is, tourists commit almost no crime," Sakanaka said of the poll.

In fact, the number of foreigners overstaying their visas has been falling for a decade, while the number of visitors to Japan per year has risen by two million over the same period to 5.7 million in 2002. Legally resident foreigners make up 1.45 per cent of the population.

Small is beautiful?

A United Nations report said Japan would need to admit 600,000 immigrants a year between 2005 and 2050 to maintain its working age population at 1995 levels.

By 2050, immigrants and their descendants would make up 30 per cent of the population.

But immigration official Sakanaka argues that such large-scale immigration without a prior effort to change attitudes could be dangerous.

"There is a concern that mass immigration under current circumstances could lead the Japanese to dislike foreigners," he said in a paper presented at the symposium. "Competition in the jobs market and cultural friction could result in violence."

Some say a change in the law would be a good start - Japan has been criticized by the UN for failing to outlaw racial discrimination.

"We have seen a lot of examples of racial discrimination recently... I think the reason is that there is no clear law against it," said Masao Niwa, a lawyer who has represented foreigners in labour and human rights cases.

Given the choice, many Japanese say they would choose elbow room over a return to economic boom times.

"There are too many people in Japan. It's a good thing the population is going to fall," said Iwao Fujimasa, a professor of policy science at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies. He says he welcomes the country's shrinking future as good for the environment and quality of life.

"If the population fell to about a quarter of what it is now, we could have a more European standard of living," he added.

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