Marutei Tsurunen (ツルネン マルテイ or 弦念 丸呈 Tsurunen Marutei, born 30 April 1940) is the first foreign-born Japanese of European origin serving as a member of the Diet of Japan.[1] He is a member of the Democratic Party of Japan, where he serves as Director General of the International Department. He is currently serving in the House of Councillors.
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Tsurunen was born Martti Turunen in the village of Jaakonvaara in Lieksa, Finland. Near the end of Continuation War, Tsurunen (then four years old) and his family were among the few survivors of a Soviet partisan attack on the village.[2]
In 1967, at the age of 27, Tsurunen traveled to Japan as a lay missionary of the Lutheran Church, accompanied by his first wife, who was also a Finn (they later divorced).[3] Having decided to become Japanese, he gained his citizenship in 1979,[4] He moved to Yugawaramachi in Kanagawa Prefecture in 1981.
He first ran for city council in 1992 in Yugawaramachi and won a seat, coming in fourth place with 1,051 votes.
He ran for a seat in the Upper House for Kanagawa without party backing in 1995. He received 339,484 votes, losing a seat to the Socialist candidate who won 371,889 votes. He ran again in 1998 and took 502,712, just 8,000 short of winning a seat. In 2000, he ran as a candidate of the Democratic Party of Japan for a seat in the Lower House, and again in 2001 for a seat in the Upper House, both unsuccessfully. However, in 2002, a person resigned from the house and he won a seat by "kuriage" replacement, by which he took the seat because he had the largest number of votes after the winner.
He was reelected in 2007 with 242,742 votes.