Former world chess champion Bobby Fischer, wanted by the United States for defying sanctions on Yugoslavia, has applied for political asylum in Japan while he appeals against a decision to deport him.
Fischer, 61, arrived in Japan in April and was detained at Narita airport near Tokyo last month when he tried to leave for the Philippines on a passport that U.S. officials say was invalid.
The chess master is wanted in the United States since 1992, when he defied U.S. economic sanctions against Yugoslavia to play a chess match there against his old rival Boris Spassky.
Japanese immigration officials last week rejected Fischer's initial appeal and his lawyer handed final documents for a second plea to Justice Minister Daizo Nozawa on Monday.
A Justice Ministry official said a decision on such an appeal is unlikely to be reached in a day or two, although the time required differs depending on the situation.
As a fallback, in case the appeal is rejected, Fischer has sought asylum in Japan as another line of defence, his Japanese lawyer Masako Suzuki said.
"In almost all cases the Japanese government will not force such a person back to their home country while the case is pending," she told Reuters after she met Fischer, who is being held at an immigration detention centre inside the airport.
Japan accepts only political refugees. Fischer's supporters in Japan say he is being persecuted by the United States.
SMOKED OUT
One of the great eccentrics of the chess world, Fischer maintains that his passport was never properly revoked and that the action was taken retroactively, his supporters say.
"He walked into the country, got stamped in legally with a visa," said Tokyo-based Canadian communications consultant John Bosnitch, who has been advising Fischer.
U.S. authorities had suddenly notified Japanese officials in June that Fischer's passport had become invalid, Bosnitch added.
Fischer disappeared after the 1992 match, apparently travelling in Europe and Asia, only to resurface after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States in an interview on Philippines radio in which he praised the attacks.
Suzuki said Fischer, who has been in custody since July 13, looked nervous and tired.
"I think he looks very tired, very fatigued. I think his condition is not good mentally, physically."
The lawyer has filed a second request for Fischer's provisional release after an earlier request was rejected.
The non-smoking chess master is also unhappy at being kept in a cell where others around him smoke freely, Bosnitch said.
"He has had no fresh air, no exercise, no sunlight and (is) smoked out all day," he said.
PLAYING FOR TIME?
A former Japanese lawmaker and chess aficionado, Ichiji Ishii, has offered to act as Fischer's guarantor if he is released while his appeal continues, since temporary immigration detention in Japan can last up to 60 days.
A Justice Ministry official said that in cases where the minister rejected an appeal, the individual would usually be quickly deported, but that this would not be possible if the person sought an injunction against deportation from a Japanese court. Ishii had said Fischer was considering such action.
Fischer became the world chess champion in 1972 when he beat Spassky of the Soviet Union in a victory seen as a Cold War propaganda coup for the United States.
The title was taken from him three years later after his conditions for a match against Anatoly Karpov, also of the Soviet Union, were rejected by chess officials.
Karpov became champion by default.
Fischer disappeared until the 1992 match against Spassky, whom he again defeated, then vanished again until his remarks on the September 11 attacks. Fischer, whose mother was Jewish, has also stirred controversy with anti-Semitic remarks.
