International students graduating in Japan could find it easier to launch their careers here if they fit into one of the categories spelled out in upcoming guidelines, which include jobs with a focus on international expansion in dining and apparel. The greater clarity on what types of workers would qualify for residency is meant to help domestic businesses hire more foreign-born talent straight out of Japanese schools. These individuals could also help promote tourism in Japan and support the Cool Japan soft-power initiative.

An effort to inform potential asylum-seekers that crossing the border is no free ride to a new Canadian life appears to be working as their numbers continue to rapidly dwindle – but the start of the school year is also playing a role. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which is monitoring the reception of asylum seekers at the most popular irregular crossing south of Montreal, says the number of processed claims has plunged to 10-50 on recent days from a peak of several hundred daily arrivals earlier in the summer.

The now US President-elect Donald Trump promised to end the long-standing J-1 Visa programme last August, which would bring about the end of what has become an institution for generations of Irish students. But will his administration actually axe the programme? [...] While concern over the long-term future of the J1 Visa programme is understandably high after the election results of November 8th, the Honourable Kevin O’Malley, Ambassador of the United States of America to Ireland, doubts that Trump’s administration will actually go ahead with the proposed change.

Oftentimes, when words fail, art has the ability to express our deepest pain and unrelenting hope. Visions from the Inside is a project enlisting 15 artists from across the country to create a piece of art based off letters from women in detention. The initiative, a collaboration between CultureStrike, Mariposas Sin Fronteras and End Family Detention, illuminates the horrific realities of life inside some for-profit detention facilities in the U.S., as well as the resilient spirit that keeps the inmates going.  

Romania has announced its doors are wide open to the Chinese after Canada tightened its immigration policy. Chinese looking to migrate to the southeast European country would be warmly welcomed, former Romanian prime minister Petre Roman said on a trip to Beijing.