Nov 11 (Japan Times) - November marks one year since the Metropolitan Police Department began a program to reduce street prostitution in Tokyo by connecting women to welfare counseling.
The initiative to help women in the capital to get back on their feet came as a result of realizing that exposing incidents was not enough to crack down on street prostitution.
A plain-clothed male MPD investigator strolled around Okubo Park in Tokyo’s Kabukicho entertainment district one night in mid-September. Many women were leaning on the guardrails or sitting by the roadside.
According to the MPD, most women caught for allegedly violating the Anti-Prostitution Act are not indicted and immediately resume the life they were leading before they went on the streets.
But many return to prostitution when they face financial hardship.
Recognizing that exposing such incidents alone will not lead to preventing relapses, the Tokyo police began listening to the women talk about their financial struggles and introducing them to consultation services offered by the metropolitan government or the capital’s wards from last November. The MPD also offers to accompany women to such consultations.
The department has helped more than 60 women through the initiative in the past year.
