Politics

Japan’s Gamblers Are Ignoring Abe’s Toothless Emergency Order

  • Parts of $192 billion pachinko industry stay open despite risk
  • Tourist spots urge people to stay away in Golden Week holidays
A customer smokes a cigarette inside the pachinko parlor in Tokyo.Photographer: Shiho Fukada/Bloomberg
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Lines outside Tokyo’s pachinko parlors show the limits of Japan’s ability to enforce social distancing, just as the country heads into a series of holidays that could be key to its attempts to control the spread of the coronavirus.