Constantine Pleshakov - The Japan Times

May 01, 2024

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Constantine Pleshakov

For Constantine Pleshakov's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Feb 21, 2005

They boil lobsters, don't they?

WASHINGTON -- A recent European study has suggested that lobsters don't feel pain when being boiled. For a lobster, the study suggests, going into a boiling pot is like taking a dip in a hot tub.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Feb 7, 2005

Sanctions against Cuba only assist Castro

MOSCOW -- To go or not to go? To trade or not to trade? To invest or not to invest? These are the questions asked nowadays by many Western governments following a recent EU decision to lift sanctions against Havana.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jan 17, 2005

Unprecedented migration has EU on edge

MOSCOW -- Barbarian invasions from the east are old news for old Europe. Over the centuries, restless nomads kept rolling through the area -- sometimes to kill, sometimes to plunder, and sometimes to plunder and stay.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jan 3, 2005

Putin's tragic gaffes of 2004

MOSCOW -- The year 2004 has had mixed blessings for Russian President Vladimir Putin. He won re-election in a landslide, and though the results were probably rigged, by and large they still reflected voters' sympathies well enough: Russia likes its president.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Nov 21, 2004

Now for 'Arafat,' the movie

MOSCOW -- Lawfully elected leaders are rarely charismatic. There must be something about a democratic vote that is incompatible with intense political charisma.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Oct 22, 2004

Russian voters prefer Bush

MOSCOW -- According to a recent international poll, Russia is among a handful of nations that largely support U.S. President George W. Bush and want him re-elected. The Democratic Party nominee, Sen. John Kerry, doesn't do well at all among Russians surveyed -- as opposed to the overwhelming approval he enjoys in France and other countries.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Sep 23, 2004

Putin's bloodless coup d'etat

MOSCOW -- In what amounts to a coup d'etat five years after he came to power in August 1999, Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced a number of measures annihilating the fragile system of checks and balances constructed during President Boris Yeltsin's tenure in the 1990s.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Sep 11, 2004

Russia's underbelly exposed

MOSCOW -- Date: Sept. 1-3, 2004.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Aug 15, 2004

Life in a Russian namesake

MOSCOW -- To be a namesake of a celebrity is a curse. A person who bears the same name as a baseball star or a TV anchorman invariably finds himself a target of countless unkind comments that demean his intellect, looks and savings account, and even make fun of the car he drives. No matter how hard he tries to distance himself from the famous double, friends and colleagues gleefully keep juxtaposing the two, driving the less prominent twin absolutely nuts.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jul 29, 2004

The Morlocks are coming!

MOSCOW -- The most common word used by foreigners to describe Soviet Russia was "gray." Be it the cityscape, clothes or official culture, everything looked evenly unpleasant, unexciting, drab. Nowadays, the maddening communist evenness is gone, but Russia has become home to something equally disturbing -- outrageous gaps and contrasts in a society molded by unbridled young capitalism.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jul 11, 2004

Exile in America inspired a revolution

MOSCOW -- George Balanchine was an exile thrice. The first time came without his consent and even without his prior knowledge, as his family went from its native Georgia in the Caucasus to the capital of Russia, St. Petersburg, before he was born.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jun 11, 2004

Simple visionary hastened Soviet collapse

MOSCOW -- Former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, who died last week after a long and dehumanizing struggle with Alzheimer's disease, will be remembered by most as one of the last great figures of the 20th century.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jun 7, 2004

Putin looks back to the future

MOSCOW -- A new catchphrase is making the rounds in Moscow: "We have already seen that." Summing up the results of the first four-year term of President Vladimir Putin, the expression is a far cry from flattery, as it refers not to the reforms of Peter the Great but to the return of the cult of personality and other phenomena peculiar to the years of stagnation under the rule of Communist Party leader Leonid Brezhnev.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

May 16, 2004

EU stretching the envelope

MOSCOW -- Nobody truly knows where Europe ends. Geographically, it is supposed to run all the way east to the Ural Mountains, but few would argue that this definition should be taken seriously. What matters is culture and politics and the allegiances resulting from both. With the recent expansion of the European Union, the question of what it takes to become a European has acquired new urgency and now causes much controversy throughout the Continent.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Apr 18, 2004

Revisiting an evil stereotype

MOSCOW -- Each country has a reputation. For France, it is wine and food; for Italy, wine, food and the pope; for Holland, canals; for Austria, skiing; for Russia vodka, snow and bears.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Mar 20, 2004

Back to the future in Russia

MOSCOW -- The outcome of Russia's presidential elections was known long before the polls opened March 14. President Vladimir Putin had successfully marginalized the opposition by placing mass media under state control and exiling tycoons who were supplying opposition groups with donations.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Mar 6, 2004

Sun sets on Russian democrac

MOSCOW -- Relapses are always regrettable, particularly when the gains lost had been won at such a high cost.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Feb 15, 2004

Don't tease the Russian bear

MOSCOW -- In this election year for both Russia and the United States, a major conflict is under way in Russo-American relations: the debate over the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Created to contain the Soviet Union during the Cold War, NATO had to redesign itself following the demise of the Red Empire.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jan 25, 2004

Surprise guests inspire unholy thoughts

MOSCOW -- It started with a rectangular jellyfish floating toward the lower right-hand corner of my computer screen. The jellyfish carried a logo, Kodak Easy Share, and was of a nauseating white-yellow-red design. The jellyfish had been there for quite a while, distracting me from students' papers and my own precariously delayed book manuscript, yet I could live with it. It was not particularly obtrusive and, having bobbed for a minute or so, disappeared in a hole it had dug for itself in the bowels of the screen.

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jan 7, 2004

Putin's plan takes aim at democracy

MOSCOW -- 2004 is a leap year. Merely an astronomical convenience in most countries, in Russia a leap year has been traditionally regarded as a bad year, potentially charged with calamities. Ironically enough, none of the country's worst years was a leap year: neither 1917, when the Communists took power, nor 1937, when Josef Stalin's great terror struck, nor 1941, when Germany attacked.

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.

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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

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Prize winner Maki Imoto catches light with glass

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