Foreign Ministry Confiscates Passport of Photographer Planning to Go to Syria

NIIGATA, JAPAN - FEBRUARY 08: Freelance photographer Yuichi Sugimoto speaks to media reporters a day after his passport was confiscated by the Foreign Ministry at his home on February 8, 2015 in Niigata, Japan. He had planned to enter Syria on February 27 to cover refugee camps, among other places. This is the first time the Foreign Ministry has issued an order to surrender a passport on the grounds the measure was needed to protect the passport holder's life. Article 19 of the passport law states that the foreign minister can order a passport holder to surrender his or her passport "in cases where there is a need to cancel a trip abroad in order to protect the life, body and assets of the passport holder." Meanwhile article 22 of the Constitution says, "Freedom of all persons to move to a foreign country... shall be inviolate." (Photo by The Asahi Shimbun via Getty Images)