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EDITORIALS

May 1, 2001

A new generation in Hanoi

By all appearances, Vietnam has concluded its Ninth Party Congress with a ringing endorsement of reform. The decision to remove Mr. Le Kha Phieu as Communist Party secretary general and replace him with Mr. Nong Duc Manh is a clear sign of growing impatience with old-style ideologues. Mr. Manh is the...

EDITORIALS

May 1, 2001

Economic ills have a silver lining

Economic problems can have positive effects. They are providing the governments in Greece and Turkey with good reasons to follow up their political rapprochement with concrete security measures. Or, as in this case, to abstain from making arms purchases that would ratchet up tensions in the region.

EDITORIALS

Apr 30, 2001

Stand up to Beijing's fury

In a move that has infuriated Beijing, U.S. President George W. Bush has decided to offer Taiwan a package of weapons that will allow the island to significantly upgrade its defenses. While four Arleigh Burke-class destroyers equipped with the Aegis air-defense system have been excluded, relations between...

EDITORIALS

Apr 29, 2001

Going somewhere in Golden Week?

If it's Golden Week, it must be time to dust off those travel statistics again. Every year, government and tourist-industry number-crunchers tell us the score on the number of Japanese traveling abroad in the madcap first week of May, as opposed to those who travel inside Japan or, most sensibly of all,...

EDITORIALS

Apr 28, 2001

Fit punishment for tragic error

Cmdr. Scott Waddle, skipper of the USS Greeneville, the nuclear submarine that collided with the Japanese fisheries training vessel Ehime Maru, resulting in the loss of nine lives, has been found guilty of violating military law. Offered a choice between retiring or explaining his actions at another...

EDITORIALS

Apr 27, 2001

Koizumi's uphill battle begins

Quixotic or not, Mr. Junichiro Koizumi, the newly elected prime minister of Japan, has largely succeeded in sticking to his maverick goal of forming a Cabinet untainted by factional politics. Both in his selection of executive officers of the Liberal Democratic Party on Wednesday and in his appointments...

EDITORIALS

Apr 26, 2001

A bold new start for the LDP

Mr. Junichiro Koizumi, who has long been regarded as an eccentric but reform-minded politician, has been elected president of the governing Liberal Democratic Party. When the four-way race started, former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto was the front-runner and odds-on favorite. Yet Mr. Koizumi caught...

EDITORIALS

Apr 25, 2001

A new era for the Americas

That is the best way to describe the decision reached last weekend by 34 Pan-American leaders. Gathering in Quebec City, they defied thousands of violent protesters and agreed to create the Free Trade Area of the Americas. The removal of trade barriers from the Arctic to the southern tip of Argentina,...

EDITORIALS

Apr 24, 2001

Mr. Lee comes with baggage

Former Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui is now on a "private" visit to Japan with a visa the Japanese government issued after days of vacillation -- and with strings attached: Mr. Lee should stay in Kurashiki City, Okayama Prefecture, where he will get a medical checkup, and should not conduct any political...

EDITORIALS

Apr 23, 2001

Minimum restraint in the Middle East

Violence flared again in the Middle East last week, with a tit-for-tat confrontation in Gaza that briefly threatened to escalate into a wider war. Although the incident ended with condemnation of Israel, both at home and abroad, for what was widely viewed as a military and diplomatic fiasco, the lesson...

EDITORIALS

Apr 22, 2001

Poetry and the people

When the poet Chaucer saw that it was April, one year in the late 1300s, he wrote cheerily about its sweet showers piercing the drought of March to the root. When T.S. Eliot saw that it was April, some five and a half centuries later, he wrote bleakly about it being the cruelest month, "breeding lilacs...

EDITORIALS

Apr 21, 2001

A reassuring signal from the Fed

One question uppermost in the minds of political and business leaders the world over probably is whether the slowing U.S. economy will pick up in the second half of this year. The Federal Reserve Board on Wednesday provided its answer by cutting key interest rates for the fourth time since January. The...

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

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.

If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami

By Alex K.T. Martin

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Tsukuba massif granite, one of the world’s few heritage stones

Tsukuba massif granite, one of the world’s few heritage stones

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