MOFA warns of Taiwanese being arrested in Japan as money mules

Taipei, Jan. 7 (CNA) A Taiwanese diplomat in charge of Japanese affairs on Tuesday urged Taiwanese nationals to be on the alert for scams offering easy pay days in Japan as a rising number of Taiwanese are being arrested there for serving as money mules for fraud rings.

At a weekly Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) briefing in Taipei, Fan Chen-kuo (范振國), secretary-general of the Taiwan-Japan Relations Association, said Taiwan's offices regularly received reports from Japanese police in 2024 of arrests of Taiwanese for allegedly working for fraud rings.

Fan could not provide specific numbers of arrests, but said that Taiwan's main representative office in Tokyo and its five branch offices around Japan routinely received at least once such call for help from arrested nationals every month last year, a much higher frequency than in 2023.

According to Fan, many of those arrested were young backpackers who traveled to Japan visa free after being lured there by social media posts promising easy money, only to end up engaging in illegal activity.

Most of those arrested served as money mules for fraud rings, responsible for directly collecting money and/or expensive items from those being scammed and then being arrested on the spot by police, Fan said.

Meanwhile, ahead of the upcoming Lunar New Year peak travel season later this month, Fan strongly advised travelers planning to visit Japan to purchase medical travel insurance to be covered in case of a medical emergency while there.

Fan said Taiwan's representative offices have received reports of several Taiwanese nationals who suddenly fell ill while visiting Japan and later facing astronomical medical fees because they did not purchase medical insurance beforehand.

Many of those medical emergencies occur in winter when a large number of Taiwanese travel to Japan for hot spring trips, he added.

Without insurance, the cost for emergency medical treatment and follow-up hospitalization could range from millions of Japanese yen to more than 10 million, he warned.