Jonathan Fenby - The Japan Times

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Jonathan Fenby

For Jonathan Fenby's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 30, 2003

Iraqi crisis highlights strains in trans-Atlantic relations

LONDON -- Since the end of World War II, Western Europe has usually sided with the United States in global conflicts. Except for a few national exceptions, such as France's criticism of the Vietnam War, trans-Atlantic solidarity has been the order of the day from the Cuban missile crisis through the Persian Gulf War.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 16, 2003

Berlin-Paris partnership faces challenges as EU grows larger

LONDON -- Forty years ago this month, President Charles de Gaulle of France and Chancellor Konrad Adenauer of West Germany signed a historic agreement to consecrate the end of 75 years of conflict between their two nations. The Franco-German Friendship Treaty came six years after the establishment of the original six-nation European Common Market, and the relationship between the two countries has been at the heart of the development of the Continent's drive for unity that has produced a 15-nation single market, and most recently, the 12-nation euro currency.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 8, 2003

Debate suffers as ruling parties dominate

LONDON -- The shape of politics is changing in the world's main democracies in a manner that Japan may find familiar. But the implications are only starting to seep through.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 29, 2002

NATO mission remains foggy

LONDON -- The invitations issued at the recent Prague conference to seven former Eastern Bloc states to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are a dramatic demonstration of how the world has changed in just a few short years.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 19, 2002

Protectionism threatens global economy

LONDON -- Japan's current row with China over steel exports is symptomatic of a growing retreat from the free trade aims that underpinned international growth in the last two decades of the 20th century. It is now a year since members of the World Trade Organization set themselves the task of reducing trade barriers at their summit in Doha. But the climate has grown chillier in the past 12 months, with worrying implications for rich and poor nations alike.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 10, 2002

A wretched winter for Tories and royals

LONDON -- This is proving to a wretched winter for two of Britain's most hallowed institutions. The reasons say much about the way the country has changed -- and is changing.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 7, 2002

EU needs a common purpose

LONDON -- Since the original European Common Market was founded in the mid-1950s, the Continent sought a common economic role, to be followed by growing political integration. Now, there is general agreement on the first count that a new institutional framework is needed to give the community more political punch, and a convention has been called under former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing to study reform. Some countries think Europe should have a president at the top of the European Union rather than the present commission in Brussels.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 22, 2002

France losing steam for radical reform

PARIS -- Three months ago, the French center-right scored two stunning electoral victories. As a result of miscalculations and voter apathy, the Socialists who had formed the government since 1997 crashed to defeat, and President Jacques Chirac was re-elected with 82 percent of the vote in a runoff ballot against the extreme right wing candidate, Jean-Marie Le Pen of the National Front. A month later, Chirac's supporters won a huge majority in parliamentary elections.

COMMENTARY / World

Jul 10, 2002

Continental drift worries EU leaders

LONDON -- Ever since the end of World War II, Western Europe and the United States have felt like partners, sharing a wide range of common values and bound militarily by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization alliance. There have, inevitably, been strains over the decades, and a need to re-assess the relationship emerged with the collapse of communism and the end of the Cold War.

COMMENTARY / World

Jun 27, 2002

Labour spinning backward

LONDON -- When its press becomes the story, a country is in a strange shape.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 24, 2002

Le Pen's shocking win shakes France to the core

PARIS -- France's presidential election system is meant to ensure both a maximum of democracy and the emergence of a strong national leadership at the end of the two rounds of voting. That was the model set by Gen. Charles de Gaulle when he established the Fifth Republic four decades ago.

COMMENTARY / World

Apr 4, 2002

Tony Blair struggles to fill Margaret Thatcher's giant shoes

LONDON -- She has been out of power for a dozen years, but former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has remained a formidable political force while her contemporaries on the world scene have faded from view.

COMMENTARY / World

Feb 28, 2002

Familiar faces fail to stir French voters

PARIS -- It could happen only in France. The president of the Republic is running for re-election as the opposition candidate while his main challenger is defending the government's record over the past five years.

COMMENTARY / World

Feb 22, 2002

New strains of anti-Semitism

LONDON -- Sixty years after the Holocaust, is anti-Semitism spreading in Europe? The question is being asked increasingly in a number of countries, notably Britain, which fought the Nazis through World War II, and France, which lived for four years under a collaborationist regime that persecuted Jews and helped to deport 70,000 to concentration camps.

COMMENTARY / World

Feb 18, 2002

Will Blair err as Icarus did?

LONDON -- No European leader rode higher in the reaction to the Sept. 11 attack in New York than Tony Blair. The British prime minister immediately rallied to the American cause, enunciated the need to fight terrorism in ringing tones and committed troops to fight in Afghanistan. At last he had emerged in the part he had long seen for himself, playing a pivotal world role and acting as a bridge between the United States and Europe.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 21, 2002

A rightist revival in Europe

LONDON -- For the past five years, the center-left has held the whip hand in Western Europe. Whether in the shape of Prime Minister Tony Blair's New Labour administration in Britain or the more traditionally leftwing Socialist-led government in France, social democracy has ruled in the major countries -- with the re-election of the Spanish right standing as the exception to the rule.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 3, 2002

Euro faces economic snags

LONDON -- The introduction on Jan. 1 of the euro currency into everyday use across 12 countries in one of the world's big three economic zones marks the accomplishment of a 50-year-old project to bring the continent together in partnership and mutual well-being as an alternative to the past periodic states of war.

COMMENTARY / World

Nov 6, 2001

Economies threaten credibility of euro

LONDON -- Ever since the common currency began to take shape in the mid-1990s, there has been a latent conflict between politicians in the euro zone and the guardians of the monetary stability pact in Frankfurt and Brussels. This autumn the politicians insist publicly that they stand four-square with the bankers and the officials at the European Commission; but the divergence is clear to see, and is only going to increase as the economic strains grow. Something may give this month.

COMMENTARY / World

Aug 25, 2001

Scandals have Chirac on the defensive

LONDON -- August is the month when, traditionally, the French forget about the cares of everyday life as they head for long holidays at home or abroad. But, this year, the most eminent of them as had a far from relaxing time. Just nine months before he faces an uphill re-election battle, President Jacques Chirac has been buffeted by scandal allegations dating back to his 18 years as the powerful mayor of Paris and leader of the Gaullist Party.

COMMENTARY / World

Aug 17, 2001

Macedonian crossfire threat

LONDON -- Ever since the Federation of Yugoslavia broke up a decade ago, the fate of the territories over which Marshal Tito ruled for most of the postwar period has provided not just an internal cycle of war and separation, but also a series of major challenges for the international community, in particular the 15-nation European Union.

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

When trying to trace your lineage in Japan, the "koseki" is the most important form of document you'll encounter.

Climbing the branches of a Japanese family tree

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

A young restaurant leads the way in Karuizawa

A young restaurant leads the way in Karuizawa

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