Alan Goodall - The Japan Times

Today's print edition

Subscribe for more access

Meta

Alan Goodall

For Alan Goodall's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

COMMENTARY / World

Jun 27, 2001

Is Canberra doing right by its refugees?

SYDNEY -- Nowhere was the poignancy of World Refugee Day on June 20 felt more acutely than in Australia. Here, the plight of thousands of refugees held in detention camps gnaws at the national conscience.

COMMENTARY / World

May 20, 2001

Changing Australia celebrates its centennial

SYDNEY -- A smiling, articulate Australian schoolgirl standing before an audience of 7,000 of Australia's top dignitaries . . . it was a grand sight, worthy of this young nation's first 100 years of democratic government.

COMMENTARY / World

May 13, 2001

Japan-Aussie relationship losing its spark

SYDNEY -- They're like an old married couple, comfortable with each other's idiosyncrasies but hardly innovative in their relationship. Yes, we're talking about Japan and Australia.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 25, 2001

Global green alliance swells Down Under

SYDNEY -- The trouble with hosting an international Greens convention is that the host country draws the criticism. Japan is still agonizing over the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Now Australia is left holding the bag following far-reaching pro-Kyoto support demonstrated at last week's Canberra talkfest.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 28, 2001

Australians try to sort good economic news from bad

SYDNEY -- With the government of Prime Minister John Howard still reeling from a by-election humiliation, along comes a morale booster -- a corporate deal that makes Australia the dominant player in global-resources trade. Comeback Kid Howard has done it again, although his chances of staying prime minister after this year's election still depend on a disgruntled electorate, not on multinational games.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 7, 2001

Australia's humble founders got it right

SYDNEY -- Egalitarianism has always ruled here, ever since the first white settlers arrived in Sydney Cove from their London jails in 1788. One of the first convicts off the boat became chief magistrate and another chief architect. Jack is not only as good as his master; here he considers himself a damn side better. Hence a "tall poppy" syndrome that cuts the heads off even the likes of early Prime Ministers Edmund Barton and Alfred Deakin.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 15, 2000

New-look forum heralds peace in paradise

SYDNEY -- Nobody, least of all any of the troubled South Pacific nations, is calling last month's Pacific Islands Forum in the island country of Kiribati a decisive victory. Yet all 16 nations that attended the historic summit see the Biketawa Declaration as the best framework yet for ensuring stability in this ill-named tropical paradise.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 15, 2000

Olympic success puts Sydney at the top

SYDNEY -- So you liked watching the world's best-ever Olympic Games? Wait, there's more. Hold that remote control for the next sports extravaganza from Australia, the Sydney 2000 Paralympics.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 17, 2000

World's eyes on Australia

SYDNEY -- With the Sydney 2000 Olympics in full swing, the country is getting used to having 3.5 billion TV viewers around the world watching our every move. This city's 4 million citizens are positively basking in the glory of staging the world's best Games yet. And to the south, Melbourne is just as proud of hosting a pivotal World Economic Forum.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 3, 2000

Sydneysiders counting down

SYDNEY -- Scrubbed and polished, the Olympics city is looking good. Sydneysiders are all-welcoming as the world jets in for Olympic Games 2000. So why are we so worried?

COMMENTARY / World

Aug 16, 2000

Australia splits on single mothers' rights

SYDNEY -- Sex and the single woman: This unlikely topic has suddenly become a political cause celebre in Australia. Even the Olympics are taking a temporary back seat to the debate on unmarried women's right to motherhood.

COMMENTARY / World

Jul 16, 2000

Whalers come out on top in IWC meeting

SYDNEY -- Once again Japanese whale-meat eaters have outwitted the world's whale lovers. Though those diners need not raise too many self-congratulatory cups of sake. Within a year or two the Tokyo whale restaurant tables could be overturned.

COMMENTARY / World

Jul 3, 2000

Australia warily watches arc of insecurity

SYDNEY -- Once the world romanticized about the South Pacific paradise. Today, Australia is guardedly debating the Balkanization of the South Pacific.

COMMENTARY / World

Jun 10, 2000

Aborigines raise their cause's profile

SYDNEY -- On its way from Greece to the Sydney Olympics 2000, the Olympic flame this week passed by Uluru, a huge rock rearing up out of the vast emptiness of the "dead heart" of Australia. Watching it were Aborigines, this country's inhabitants for the past 50,000 years, to whom Uluru is sacred.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 3, 2000

United Nations takes Australia to task

SYDNEY -- Oh, the disgrace of it. Just as we were on our best behavior to receive the queen, the United Nations had to go and tell the whole world that Australia's treatment of its Aborigines is discriminatory and unsatisfactory.

COMMENTARY / World

Mar 1, 2000

Tough new laws stir outrage in Australia

SYDNEY -- Johnno, a 15-year-old Aboriginal boy, steals a few pencils and some paint. The magistrate has no option but to send him to prison for four weeks. After three weeks behind bars, Johnno hangs himself.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 24, 1999

Australia out for justice in East Timor

SYDNEY -- Still the broken skulls are being unearthed. And still the United Nations talks on. Soon, Australia fears, the evidence of atrocities in East Timor will be scattered and, worse, forgotten.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 22, 1999

Australia's belated epiphany

SYDNEY -- As an Australian-led multinational rescue mission landed at burned-out Dili on Monday, a shocked nation is asking: How could Indonesia have permitted such horror? And could we have done more to prevent this Asian holocaust?

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 17, 1999

Fourteen planes, six boats and a chopper

SYDNEY -- The boat people are landing. Although still just a trickle, the mostly Chinese illegal immigrants look set to flood through the open door named Australia. Nor is it just human cargo being offloaded on these unprotected shores. Heroin from the Golden Triangle of Southeast Asia is also being dumped here by the triads of South China.

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.

[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.

The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Students ‘study abroad’ on island of Suo Oshima

Students ‘study abroad’ on island of Suo Oshima

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER

international-reports