The number of foreign residents in Japan has reached a record high of more than 3.7 million.



The Immigration Services Agency says there were around 3,769,000 foreign residents in the country as of the end of last year. That was 358,000 more than at the end of the previous year.



By category, there were about 457,000 foreign technical interns, up 52,000 from a year ago. The number of students was 402,000, up 61,000. The number of people with special skilled worker status rose by 76,000 to 284,000.



The agency says more people came to Japan after coronavirus border control measures were relaxed and the yen weakened.



Meanwhile, there were 1,184 cases in which foreign nationals had their residence status revoked. That was 56 less than in the previous year.



The number of those who had their technical intern status revoked reached 710, followed by 312 cases of student residence status revocations. Some technical interns lost their status after it was found they were working in sectors outside their permitted field.