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COMMENTARY

Oct 17, 2005

Toward a new Constitution

By Keizo Nabeshima

The special constitution research committee of the Lower House has started debate on establishing legislation to make it possible for Japan to hold a national referendum on revising the Constitution.

EDITORIALS

Oct 16, 2005

The latest battle of Trafalgar

I t doesn't sound like the kind of thing you'd take your children to see: a 3.5-meter-high, gleaming marble statue of a naked woman who is not only eight-plus months pregnant but also physically deformed, with no arms and stunted legs. Yet just such a statue was installed in London's refurbished Trafalgar...

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Oct 16, 2005

Lenin can still save Russia

By Constantine Pleshakov

MOSCOW -- To: Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation

COMMENTARY

Oct 16, 2005

China needs an independent judiciary

By Frank Ching

HONG KONG -- China has performed a miracle over the last quarter century, lifting hundreds of millions of people from dire poverty and turning the country into an economic powerhouse. In the process, Beijing has raised people's expectations not only of a better life but of a fairer society.

COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT

Oct 16, 2005

Havin' a talk with 'God' and his Oval Office cronies

By Roger Pulvers

U.S. President George W. Bush has apparently declared, in a program to be aired next week on the BBC, that God instructed him to "fight the terrorists" in Afghanistan and Iraq.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 16, 2005

One language isn't enough for any country

By Domenico Maceri

SANTA MARIA, California -- Almost 99 percent of Luxembourg's citizens can speak a second language, according to a European Union survey. At the other end of the spectrum are the British, only 30 percent of whom know a second language. In the case of Americans the figure is only 12 percent.

COMMENTARY

Oct 15, 2005

Statesman test for Koizumi

By Ralph Cossa

TOKYO -- Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has demonstrated that he is a brilliant politician. His resounding victory in the Sept. 11 Lower House Diet elections provides him with an opportunity to demonstrate his brilliance as an international statesman as well.

COMMENTARY

Oct 15, 2005

Asia's tough but not impossible journey

By Tom Plate

LOS ANGELES -- Perhaps the prospects of would-be Asian political unity can best be described as a "pipe dream." But even that description might be too optimistic, unless you imagine a water pipe filled with wildly psychedelic substances that are imbibed in huge amounts!

EDITORIALS

Oct 15, 2005

Reining in medical expenditures

The Japanese spent 31.4 trillion yen for medical services in fiscal 2004, or about 246,000 yen per person, an increase of 2 percent from the previous year. The figure of 2 percent may be a small and acceptable growth, requiring no stricter lid on the rise of the nation's medical spending. But Japan's...

EDITORIALS

Oct 14, 2005

Nuclear program raises issues

The Atomic Energy Commission is expected to adopt a long-term nuclear program by the end of the month. In its draft, the commission has stated its desire to continue its policy of establishing a nuclear-fuel cycle that reprocesses all the spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium for future use as nuclear...

COMMENTARY

Oct 14, 2005

Missile defense will define Japan-U.S. security alliance

By Robyn Lim

The impasse about the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps air station at Futenma in Okinawa caused U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to cancel his forthcoming visit to Japan. So Rumsfeld, fed up with Japanese foot-dragging for more than a decade, will be going to China and South Korea, but not to...

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 14, 2005

Can DVDs help stabilize and unite Asia?

By Eric Teo Chu Cheow

SINGAPORE -- Despite and beyond the copyright infringement issue, the booming "DVD phenomenon" in Asia appears to have a strategic importance to governments and a real psychological value to consumers. In fact, the DVD is replacing the video cassette as the best-selling item on the consumer market in...

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

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

After pandemic-era border regulations eased, Indian migrants began returning to Japan. Their population now stands at more than 50,000 across the country.

How remote work is rewriting the migrant experience in Japan

By Megha Wadhwa

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Ishii Iron Works remakes self for workers, new energy

Ishii Iron Works remakes self for workers, new energy

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