976 S. K. ISHII Service Japan’ survey found that there were 241 children of foreign parent(s) under the protection of child guidance centres in Japan (Okuda 2002, 25–27). In 2017, the nationality of 166 children in 72 orphanages was ‘ambiguous’; this represented 24% of all orphanages (300 facilities) replying with valid responses (Ishii and Azukisawa 2019, 24–25). This study focusses on children abandoned in Japan by inter-Asian migrant parent(s) (19 of the 24 interviewed abandoned children had parent(s) from East/Southeast Asia, namely China, Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand). The children of inter-Asian migrant parent(s) were classified as abandoned (8) or deported (11). Abandoned children were left behind by their parents, losing contact with them. Deported children’s unauthorised migrant parent(s) were deported by the Immigration Bureau, and such children were sent to orphanages while their parents stayed at detention centres. Usually, these children’s nationalities were registered in their parents’ home country and they were deported with their parents. Amongst those two types of stateless children found at orphanages, this paper will focus on abandoned children. Issues of deported children (children who are found with their unauthorised migrant parents, recover their nationality, and are deported to their country of nationality) will be discussed in another paper. Materials and methods This study used interviews with staff members in Japanese orphanages who described and compared the situation of two different pairs of siblings whose statelessness was not realised until it was too late. This article uses field data collected in two phases between October 2017 and January 2018 from registered orphanages in Japan (n = 602).7 In phase one, questionnaires inquiring about the children of migrant parent(s) who may be stateless were mailed to all 602 orphanages registered with the Japanese National Council of Homes for Children (Ishii and Azukisawa 2019, 37–38). A total of 599 questionnaires reached the orphanages (three were returned for incorrect addresses), and 303 orphanages responded. A total of 300 responses were deemed valid (three were excluded for invalid [contradicting and outdated] information). In phase two, semi-structured interviews were conducted in nine orphanages, spread over five prefectures in three districts in eastern and central Japan (Kanto, Tokai, and Koshinetsu), that agreed to participate. Of these, one is in a major Japanese city with a population of over 10 million; two in the suburbs of major cities; and six in rural and coastal areas in and around small and mid-sized towns with populations ranging between 10,000 and 200,000. Interviews were conducted with 12 staff members: nine full-time care staff members, two vice-directors, and one director. Of them, ten directly cared for children who fit this study’s scope. Twenty-four detailed cases of abandoned children were collected. The key structures that result in the statelessness of abandoned children, as gleaned from the interviews, were roughly divided into two categories according to how the children lost the opportunity to acquire citizenship. The first category (9/24) includes children whose foreign parent(s) asked someone (often a Japanese maternal hospital staff or Japanese municipal office staff) to send their children away for care, later losing contact. In these cases, no parent(s) immediately abandoned their children, but gradually lost contact as the parent(s) moved to new destinations, developed new life stages (especially new families with new partners), and so on. Migrant parent(s), particularly female migrants, often resort to migrating again to escape criticism, condemnation, and stigma