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Chico Harlan
For Chico Harlan's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
JAPAN / ANALYSIS
Dec 9, 2013
Lack of back channels has China talks on ice
Vice President Joe Biden urged Japan and China last week to set up "effective channels of communication" to avoid a dangerous escalation in their increasingly fraught dispute over maritime territory. But the estrangement between the Asian powers is so deep they are barely talking.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 6, 2013
Shin-Okubo, window on a sad regional rift
The crowds at Tokyo's Koreatown have been replaced by a small but strident group of anti-Korean protesters who are turning it into a barometer of Japan-Korea relations.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / ANALYSIS
Nov 17, 2013
Disaster-prone Philippines slow to address issues
In one of the world's most naturally deadly countries, catastrophes can originate almost anywhere. Flash floods race down mountainsides. A zigzag of tectonic plates collide below. Typhoons build in warm ocean waters and then tear westward.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech
Nov 6, 2013
Thanks to old law, South Korea stuck as the land of Internet Explorer
South Korea is renowned for its digital innovation, with coast-to-coast broadband and a 4G LTE network that reaches into Seoul's subway system. But this tech-savvy country is stuck in a time warp in one way: its slavish dependence on Internet Explorer.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Oct 30, 2013
Rescues of South Koreans abducted by North come with controversy
In divided Korea, even the homecomings can be bitter.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 22, 2013
No. 1 water woes laid to Tepco's ineptitude
Two and a half years after the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant experienced its three reactor-core meltdowns, the effort to clean up what remains of the complex is turning into another kind of disaster.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Sep 17, 2013
After decades of growth, South Korea is now a land full of apartments
South Korea is a nation covered by apartments, so much so that from above, it resembles a coast-to-coast game of dominoes. Apartment buildings snake around mountains and form jarring clusters in the countryside. In cities, they align in grids that stretch for several kilometers.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Aug 19, 2013
Officials search for fortune of Chun Doo-hwan, South Korea's last dictator
South Korea's last dictator lives in an L-shaped mansion protected by 5-meter stone walls and a plainclothes security team. He almost never goes outside, his longtime lawyer says, given the scrutiny he would face. Highlighting the extent of change in the nation he once ruled, Chun Doo-hwan is whiling away his golden years in a home that is a virtual prison.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 5, 2013
Openings of Iwaki beaches offer semblance of normalcy
Every day, at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., a part-time worker at one of Fukushima's most well-known beaches walks toward the shoreline and lowers a dosimeter to the water. The device measures radiation, and its readings this summer have delivered the best news one can hope for 70 km south of a still-leaking nuclear plant:
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 20, 2013
Nation set for rare political continuity
After cycling through seven prime ministers in seven years, the Upper House election is about to see the nation break free from its most vexing political pattern: instability.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
May 27, 2013
Sibling spy case spotlights North Korean defectors
Earlier this year, one of the most prominent North Korean defectors, Yoo Woo Sung, walked out of his apartment building in Seoul and found four South Korean government vehicles waiting for him.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Apr 30, 2013
North Korea's weapon of choice: news agency
North Korea has kept the surrounding region on edge in recent weeks primarily by using its weapon of choice in times of warmongering: its state-run news agency.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Apr 16, 2013
Yeonpyeong attack raised South Korea's resolve
North Korea's fatal artillery attack on the border island of Yeonpyeong over two years ago uprooted old wooden houses from their foundations. One shell punctured the concrete side of a soccer stadium, another struck a rooftop oil tank. Residents rushed to underground bunkers, and when they emerged hours later, much of their isle was aflame.
ASIA PACIFIC
Apr 8, 2013
With latest tensions, Seoul puts North at arm's length
Despite years of tensions, a majority of South Koreans have long clung to a cautiously optimistic vision for their peninsula's future. Even if North and South Korea weren't one day unified, the thinking went, the countries would at least be connected by joint business ventures and rail lines, with some there even traveling on weekends to resorts in the North's mountainsides.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 12, 2013
Work resumes on Aomori's new Oma nuclear plant
At the remote northwestern tip of a snowy peninsula, beyond a small road of fishing shacks and empty one-story homes, 600 construction workers and engineers are building a brand-new nuclear plant for a country still recovering from the most severe atomic disaster since Chernobyl.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health
Jan 31, 2013
Schools have knack for healthy meals
In Japan, school lunch means a regular meal, not one that harms your health. The food is grown locally and almost never frozen. There's no mystery behind the meat. From time to time, parents even call up with an unusual question: Can they get the recipes?
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 20, 2013
China may prevent Korean unification: U.S. report
A recent report by Republican staff members in the U.S. Senate warns that China, because of its deepening economic ties with North Korea as well as its ancient claims on Korean land, could attempt to "manage, and conceivably block," the eventual unification of the two Koreas, if ever the Kim family falls from power in Pyongyang.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Jan 9, 2013
In North Korea, a leader rises while brothers fade
Kim Jong Un is portrayed in North Korea's official state media as a leader without comparison, blessed with a supreme bloodline, flanked by a supportive wife and endowed with the "brilliant" ability to revamp the economy, command an army and guide the space program.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 19, 2012
'Motherly leader' in final poll push
South Korea has the chance Wednesday to elect a woman to its top office, an unprecedented step in a nation long dominated by boardrooms of men and ranked only slightly ahead of most Islamic countries when it comes to gender equality.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech
Dec 12, 2012
'Republic of Samsung' viewed warily at home
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A statue of "Dragon Ball" character Goku stands outside the offices of Bandai Namco in Tokyo. The figure is now as recognizable as such characters as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man.
Akira Toriyama's gift to the world