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August 26, 2025

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EDITORIALS

Jan 9, 2007

Driving a train under pressure

On the morning of April 25, 2005, a "rapid service" (express) commuter train derailed along a curve between Tsukaguchi and Amagasaki stations on the West Japan Railway Co.'s Fukuchiyama Line in Hyogo Prefecture, slamming into a nine-story condominium building near the tracks. The accident killed 106...

EDITORIALS

Jan 8, 2007

World epidemic defies retreat

The HIV/AIDS epidemic continues to grow more than 25 years after the epidemic was identified, despite worldwide efforts to prevent and contain it. According to a recent update on the epidemic jointly issued by UNAIDS (Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS) and WHO (World Health Organization), an estimated...

EDITORIALS

Jan 7, 2007

Toyota as No. 1

Fifty years ago, Toyota Motor Co., a virtually unknown upstart, entered the U.S. market. Last month, Toyota predicted that it would become the world's largest automaker in 2007, overtaking General Motors. In U.S. auto sales for 2006, Toyota passed Chrysler Group and became No. 3. That is a remarkable...

EDITORIALS

Jan 6, 2007

Two nations bigger

With the arrival of 2007, Romania and Bulgaria joined the European Union, increasing its membership to 27 states. Simultaneously, Slovenia adopted the euro, Europe's single currency, becoming the first former communist state to do so and the 13th member of the euro-zone. The accession of Romania, with...

EDITORIALS

Jan 5, 2007

Solidarity to reproduce

A new forecast says Japan's population will drop by about 40 million from 2005 to about 89 million by 2055 and about 40 percent of the population will be at least 65 years old. The forecast by the health ministry's National Institute of Population and Social Security Statistics clearly shows that a population...

EDITORIALS

Jan 5, 2007

Clean process for governors

Last year saw 15 local government heads arrested in connection with corruption in the bidding process for public projects. Three of them were the governors of Fukushima, Wakayama and Miyazaki prefectures. The elimination of bid rigging will help local government heads regain the trust of local residents....

EDITORIALS

Jan 4, 2007

Deja vu in 2007

Readers should be prepared for a recurring sense of deja vu in the year ahead. Few of the problems that dominated international affairs in 2006 were resolved. The headline issues that absorbed decision makers will continue to demand time and attention in 2007. There is little hope for resolution as neither...

EDITORIALS

Jan 3, 2007

Wages of brute force

Saddam Hussein is dead. The former Iraqi dictator went to the gallows before sunrise Saturday morning in Baghdad, with a Quran in one hand, crying for justice. In death as in life, he divided his country: Shiites danced in the streets and fired guns in the air, while Sunnis mourned the passing of a martyr...

EDITORIALS

Jan 1, 2007

A political showdown year

Mr. Shinzo Abe's administration at first seemed to have smooth sailing. By visiting China and South Korea and holding summits with their leaders, the prime minister managed to improve Japan's relations with the two neighbors. The relations had soured as a result of his predecessor Junichiro Koizumi's...

EDITORIALS

Dec 31, 2006

Japan turns a corner

The year 2006 will go down in history as a turning-point year during which Japan experienced a resurgence in nationalist sentiment and felt a weakening in the influence of the lessons from its modern wars (1930s through 1945). As a result, concerns have mounted that the pillars of Japan's postwar democracy...

EDITORIALS

Dec 30, 2006

2006, politics and personalities

The year 2006 may best be remembered as a year when outsize personalities drove events -- rather than abstract political forces -- although there were, as always, lingering issues that defied resolution. In Pyongyang, supreme leader Kim Jong Il continued his brinkmanship, struggling to keep the world's...

EDITORIALS

Dec 29, 2006

Loose ends in fabrication scandal

Punishment at last has been meted out to now-disqualified structural designer Hidetsugu Aneha, the main player in the earthquake-resistance data-fabrication scandal that surfaced in November 2005. The Tokyo District Court Tuesday sentenced him to five years in prison, coupled with a 1.8 million yen fine,...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.

From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

Smile! It’s ‘Sanrio Time,’ now and ever after

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