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JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Reform of state health care advances

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry said Friday that it will close an additional 15 state-run medical facilities and privatize 17 others over the next five years.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Small firms failing to expand through IT

Despite the steady spread of information technology among smaller companies, firms are failing to utilize IT to expand their business and create new opportunities, according to a government report released Friday.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Ito to be promoted to IHI president

Mototsugu Ito, senior managing director of Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries Co., has been nominated to assume the company's presidency, replacing Toshifumi Takei, company sources said Friday.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Compensation deal reached with incinerator firm

The government has agreed to pay an industrial waste disposal company near the U.S. Atsugi Naval Air Facility in Kanagawa Prefecture some 5.2 billion yen in compensation for halting the operations of its incinerators, which have been linked to high levels of dioxin, officials said Friday.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Diet members, proxies visit Yasukuni Shrine

Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine hosted 86 Diet members and 97 proxies for other legislators Friday during a special memorial service dedicated to Japan's war dead.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 21, 2001

China faces a dilemma in ties with U.S.

HONG KONG -- In the end, China released those 24 members of the crew of the U.S. EP-3E reconnaissance plane just in the nick of time. The end of the crew's detention -- plus China's decision not to put any of the crew on trial, as some hardliners had advocated -- came just in time to undercut a growing...
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Sogo shareholders file suit against ex-chairman, auditor

OSAKA -- Eight shareholders of Sogo Co. filed a lawsuit Friday against the former chairman of the collapsed department store chain and the company's auditor, seeking some 8 million yen to cover losses from the sharp drop in the firm's stock price.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Koreans weigh merits of gaining Japan citizenship

Staff writer One Hokkaido resident is too proud to give up his South Korean nationality despite the disadvantages it brings while living in Japan.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Economic gauge revised downward

The government said Friday that it has revised downward its key gauge of the state of the economy for February due to weak production-related data.
BASEBALL / MLB
Apr 21, 2001

Tigers roar to third straight win

The Hanshin Tigers extended their winning streak to three games for the first time this season after beating Chunichi 7-2 at Koshien Stadium on Friday night.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Coalition to cut tax on small capital gains

The ruling coalition on Friday finalized proposals for revising securities taxes, which feature incentives for individual investors to boost flagging markets.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 21, 2001

Speaking in tongues for a national day of prayer

At 82, and a spirited minister to world leaders, Harald Bredesen may be forgiven his excesses. Not only does he have a gift of the gab, but an enthusiasm for quoting so loudly from Scripture in public places that it turns heads. (In our hotel coffee shop, he has to be thrice shushed.)
MORE SPORTS
Apr 21, 2001

Japan's top sprinter to retire

Former national record-holder Satoru Inoue, who represented Japan at the 1992 and 1996 Olympics, announced his retirement Thursday after a comeback attempt failed due to a series of injuries.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Chiyoda Life returns as AIG unit

Failed insurer Chiyoda Mutual Life Insurance Co. started anew Friday as AIG Star Life Insurance Co., with regaining customer confidence as the first order of business.
COMMENTARY
Apr 21, 2001

Koizumi takes an early lead

Political turmoil is brewing as the governing Liberal Democratic Party gears up to elect its next president April 24. Whoever is elected will replace the unpopular Yoshiro Mori as prime minister.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Asian city chiefs to meet in October

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government will host a meeting involving the figureheads of several major Asian cities on Oct. 17 and 18, Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara said Friday.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Apr 21, 2001

Jane Best Cooke

In Queen Elizabeth II's New Year's honors list, Jane Best Cooke was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire. She was awarded this distinction in recognition of her contribution to the promotion in Japan of British culture, and to a wide range of charitable and international friendship activities....
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Apr 21, 2001

A time of rapid change and slow speech

Are you, or have you ever been, a member of the Japanese workforce? Like cards, you have been shuffled and dealt out to a different department or location within your company, as if you worked for Trump.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Cheap leek imports from China seen as a problem Japan helped to create

Last summer, Toichi Ubukata stood aghast before vast fields of leeks in the village of Shalingzhen in Shandong Peninsula, about 500 km southeast of Beijing.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

'Metal fatigue' threatens LDP's power: Nakasone

The decline in the power of the Liberal Democratic Party is a key reason behind the string of short-lived administrations over the past decade, according to former Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone.
BUSINESS
Apr 21, 2001

Mitsui to buy up Brazil mining firm

Trading house Mitsui & Co. said Friday that it will acquire all the shares of Caemi Mineracao e Metalurgia SA (CMM), a leading Brazilian mining firm, with an eye to selling half later to another Brazilian firm.
JAPAN
Apr 21, 2001

Judge avoids trial for giving wife investigative info

A Diet committee considering the impeachment of judges said Friday that it will not take action against a senior Fukuoka judge who received information on a police investigation into death threats allegedly made by his wife.
COMMENTARY
Apr 21, 2001

U.S. must seek three-way balance in Asia

LOS ANGELES -- China is about to get a new U.S. ambassador. But will it get a new U.S. China policy?
EDITORIALS
Apr 20, 2001

Use agriculture safeguards sparingly

Japan is set to impose emergency restrictions on three Chinese agricultural products, imports of which have risen markedly in recent years: leeks, shiitake mushrooms and rushes for tatami matting. It is the first time Japan has decided to invoke "safeguards," temporary import curbs recognized by the...
BUSINESS
Apr 20, 2001

Overall trade surplus down, but rises with U.S.

The nation's trade surplus in fiscal 2000 fell 20.6 percent from the previous 12 months to 9.61 trillion yen, marking the second consecutive year of decline, the Finance Ministry said Thursday in a preliminary report.

Longform

A mushroom cloud from the atomic bombing on Hiroshima taken from a U.S. military aircraft on Aug. 6, 1945. Copying the photo without permission is prohibited.
80 years on, a Japanese American hibakusha recalls the day the bomb dropped