Japan Plans to Resume Issuance of Transit Visas to German Jews

The Japanese Government intends to resume the issuance of transit visas to German Jews, but not to Jews who hold Polish passports, it was learned today.

As reason for the different treatment of German and Polish Jews it was explained here that while most of the German Jews who receive Japanese transit visas are holders of immigration visas to various countries on the American continent, there are now more than 2,000 Polish Jews stranded in Kobe for several weeks who arrived in Japan with transit visas but who have not as yet succeeded in securing immigration visas to countries of their final destination.

A group of Jewish refugees from Poland who left Japan for Palestine are now stranded in Bombay, India, it was reported here today. Other refugees who intended to proceed from here to Palestine have no chance to do so since no Palestine immigration certificates could be secured for them.

Two representatives of the Jewish Agency, Leiser Schupakevich and Zorach Warhaftig, proceeded from here to Shanghai to see what could be done for Jewish refugees stranded in Shanghai on their way from Soviet-occupied Lithuania to Palestine. There are more than 10,000 Jewish refugees in Shanghai dependent on relief.

Almost every central Jewish relief organization now maintains special representatives in Japan to organize aid for the stranded refugees. Delegates of the Joint Distribution Committee, HIAS-ICA Emigration Association and the Agudath Israel of America have arrived in Kobe to render assistance to the 2,000 refugees there. Dr. Neumann, delegate of the Agudath Israel, is especially interested in alleviating the plight of several hundred yeshivah students who reached Japan from Lithuania but lack visas for countries of destination.