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JAPAN
Jan 11, 1999

Indians invited to celebrate Republic Day

The Indian Embassy is inviting Indians in Japan to a flag-hoisting event to celebrate Indian Republic Day Jan. 26 at 8:45 a.m.
JAPAN
Jan 11, 1999

Teen-keen priest gets suspended term for threat

A Buddhist priest was sentenced Monday to 14 months imprisonment, suspended for four years, for threatening to expose a female high school student's prostitution activities unless she told police that she was lying about his involvement in teenage prostitution.
JAPAN
Jan 11, 1999

Sick? 60% prefer to work

About 60 percent of company employees over 40 would not call in sick if they caught a cold, and three out of four would go to work even if they had fevers as high as 37.5, according to a recent survey by a major pharmaceutical firm.
EDITORIALS
Jan 9, 1999

Marriage, divorce and the future

In the early days of a new year, when most of the public is on holiday and many people are traveling away from home, it is all too easy for important news to be overlooked or even dismissed as nothing new. That seems to have been the case with the scant attention paid to the announcement published on...
EDITORIALS
Jan 8, 1999

The trial of the century

On Thursday, the 100 senators of the 106th U.S. Congress were sworn in as jurors to hear the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton. The legislators, who consider themselves part of "the world's greatest deliberative body," thus began the second such trial in U.S. history, 131 years after their...
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

Wholesale prices dropped 1.5% during '98

Domestic wholesale prices in 1998 dropped 1.5 percent from the previous year, while those for December remained unchanged from the month before, the Bank of Japan said Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

Four more step forward in sleep drug-robbery case

YOKOHAMA — Four women in their 20s have told Kanagawa Prefectural Police they were drugged by a man believed to be the same one who was arrested Thursday for allegedly drugging and robbing a Hachioji, Tokyo, college student, police said on Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

Heavy snow pelts Sea of Japan coast

Heavy snow fell in and around the mountains along the Sea of Japan coast Friday, prompting the Meteorological Agency to warn of even larger accumulations today.
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

LDP, Liberals muzzle bureaucrats

The Liberal Democratic Party and the Liberal Party agreed during working-level talks Friday to abolish a system in which bureaucrats answer questions in Diet deliberations instead of Cabinet ministers, beginning in the 2000 regular Diet session.
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

Minicars secure No. 2 sales spot for Honda

Pushed down by the serious economic slump, domestic sales of new minivehicles dropped 4.1 percent to 1,551,330 units in calendar 1998, an industry group said on Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 8, 1999

Nakai Securities ready to shut down

Nakai Securities Co. reported Friday to the Kinki Local Finance Bureau that it will voluntarily shut down.
EDITORIALS
Jan 7, 1999

Courting risks in Angola

Twice in the last two weeks, U.N.-chartered aircraft have crashed in central Angola. In both cases, the fate of the passengers and crew -- 24 people in total -- is unknown, as is the cause of the crashes. Neither the government nor the rebels of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola...
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

MITI minister foresees trade friction

Vice Trade Minister Osamu Watanabe expressed concern Thursday that trade friction may grow between Tokyo and Washington this year, with U.S. economic growth likely to slow after years of booming.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Coalition panels agree to alter SDF law

The Liberal Democratic Party and prospective coalition partner Liberal Party agreed at working-level talks Thursday to revise existing legislation that prevents the Self-Defense Forces from participating in U.N. peacekeeping forces.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Tokyo to snub Russia call to treat treaty, border separately

Japan plans to reject Moscow's proposal to discuss the timing and method for drawing a demarcation line between the two nations separately from the peace treaty the two nations hope to sign by 2000, government sources said Thursday.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Missile launch would halt KEDO aid, Norota warns

Japan will suspend financial assistance to a project to construct light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea if Pyongyang dares to launch another missile, Defense Agency chief Hosei Norota said Thursday.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Nakajima pleads guilty to vote-buying, vows to quit Diet

House of Representatives member Yojiro Nakajima, 39, pleaded guilty Thursday to providing 20 million yen to his supporters to buy votes during the 1996 general election, and said he will resign from the Diet.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Japan, EU seek investment protection rules

Japan and the European Union will jointly propose creating a set of rules to protect direct cross-border investments from official seizures and illicit interference at the next round of world trade liberalization talks, government sources said Thursday.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

Century of Change: SDF shackled by constitutional roots

On Sept. 6, 1976, two Japanese F-4 Phantom jets were scrambled from Chitose Air Base in southern Hokkaido after Air Self-Defense Force radar picked up an unidentified aircraft approaching Japan.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 1999

IBJ will raise prime rate to 2.9%

The Industrial Bank of Japan on Thursday said that it will raise its long-term prime rate, last increased in July, 0.7 percentage point to 2.9 percent on Friday.
EDITORIALS
Jan 6, 1999

Paying for our technology fetish

Most people must have heard about the so-called "Year 2000 problem," or Y2K, as the turn-of-the-millennium computer glitch is known in techno-speak. Newspaper columns are filled with warnings of pandemonium in banking systems, airport control towers and other vital public facilities, just because computers,...
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Nissan to sell textile unit to Toyoda Loom

Nissan Motor Co. has reached a basic agreement with Toyoda Automatic Loom Works Ltd. to transfer its water jet textile business to the founding firm of the Toyota Motor group, the two firms announced on Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

'Molester friends' held in thefts

Seven men who claimed to be "molester friends" were arrested on suspicion of stealing from homes in Osaka, Kyoto and Shiga Prefecture over a period of six years, it was learned Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Sanyo expands merit pay system to 5,000

Sanyo Electric Co. will introduce a merit pay system in April that will apply to roughly 5,000 of its managerial-level employees, company sources said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Century of Change: Foreign press find Japan tough to figure

In 1890, an Irish-born writer of limited success found his spiritual home after arriving upon the shores of what was then considered by the West to be the world's most exotic country.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Protests seen for Myanmar junta official

A top Myanmar military intelligence official will visit Japan later this month at the invitation of the Foreign Ministry in efforts to strengthen dialogue between Tokyo and Yangon through personnel exchanges, ministry officials said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Obuchi pushes party efforts on coalition accords

Before leaving for Europe Wednesday, Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi instructed members of his Liberal Democratic Party to work hard to find common ground with the Liberal Party on various policy issues ahead of the formation of their planned coalition.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Partial treaty for two isles' return denied

Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiromu Nonaka denied a media report that Japan is considering proposing an interim treaty with Russia to ensure the return of two of the four Russian-held islands off Hokkaido.
JAPAN
Jan 6, 1999

Coalition panels outrule SDF for armed U.N. operations

The Liberal Democratic Party and the Liberal Party confirmed Wednesday that the Self-Defense Forces will not participate in United Nations armed operations, according to representatives of the two parties.
EDITORIALS
Jan 5, 1999

Some crimes cannot be forgiven

The end of the Khmer Rouge, the gang of zealots who killed at least 1 million people in the four years they ruled Cambodia, was only a matter of time. Mercifully, it seems that time has finally come. Late last month, two of the three surviving leaders of the movement, Mr. Khieu Samphan and Mr. Nuon Chea,...

Longform

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