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COMMENTARY / World
Jan 28, 2013

Rising son can't resolve India's leadership crisis

When Rahul Gandhi was formally anointed to the number two position in India's Congress party, his installation as vice president was accompanied by the usual shenanigans among party operatives.
Reader Mail
Jan 26, 2013

When 'patriotism' is a liability

I don't have an opinion about the legitimacy of NHK dismissing French employee Emmanuelle Bodin after she fled the country following the March 11, 2011, earthquake and subsequent nuclear plant disaster. (She is now suing the broadcaster over her dismissal.) But I do have an opinion about how the dismissal...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 26, 2013

How Kan-do attitude averted the meltdown of Japan

Covering the catastrophic series of events that began with the magnitude 9 earthquake and the tsunami it triggered on March 11, 2011, 'Tu014dden Fukushima Genpatsu Jiko Su014dri Toshite Kangaeta Koto' is one of the most revealing and insightful books published in Japan in the past decade.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Jan 25, 2013

Cartwright confident he can turn lowly Osaka around

Former NBA center Bill Cartwright looks forward to his first weekend as the Osaka Evessa head coach, leading the team in action against the visiting Miyazaki Shining Suns.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 25, 2013

Address shows Obama is playing make-believe

There was a make-believe quality to U.S. President Barack Obama's second inaugural address, as if all that's required to solve serious problems are the intelligence to produce proper policies and the political grit to get them approved. Perish the thought that there are deep conflicts among the things...
EDITORIALS
Jan 25, 2013

Targeting the use of mercury

More than 140 countries in Geneva agree on a treaty that marks the first step in global efforts to prevent health-environmental damage from mercury.
ASIA PACIFIC
Jan 24, 2013

India rape panel calls for drastic reforms

The judicial panel set up in the wake of national protests following the gang rape of a young woman on a bus in New Delhi submitted its report Wednesday, castigating politicians, police and the army for failing to protect women and children and calling for far-reaching changes in the way India is governed....
EDITORIALS
Jan 24, 2013

Discovered while still alive

Natsuko Kuroda, 75, the oldest person yet to win the literary Akutagawa Prize, expressed appreciation that jurors discovered her 'while I am alive.'
Reader Mail
Jan 23, 2013

Big expense for selective gain

Regarding William Noll's Jan. 17 letter, "Olympics bid a waste of money": I, too, strongly oppose hosting the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.
Reader Mail
Jan 23, 2013

'Flyjin' demonstrated a reality

There is an old rule about judging people by their actions: Don't generalize. Generalizing may allow you to sound funny at first, but on second take, you may appear completely off the mark. Consider Emmanuelle Bodin (subject of the Jan. 16 article "Frenchwoman fired for leaving Japan during 3/11 nuclear...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 23, 2013

The art and poetics of a domestic environment

Jaws dropped as American filmmaker Jim Jarmusch, arriving in Japan in the 1980s, named Yasujiro Ozu as one of the directors he was most inspired by. Ozu, active from the 1920s up to the 1960s, was then considered old fashioned for his slow pace and lack of movement, and for the middle-class sensibilities...
JAPAN / DAVOS SPECIAL 2013
Jan 23, 2013

Looking to bring Japan's tastes to new markets through sake

As people across the globe toasted the New Year this month, Japan's sake brewers had another reason to celebrate. The industry saw modest increases in sake sales, offering a glimmer of hope to producers who have watched consumption decline since the late 1970s. According to the Japanese Sake and Shochu...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 23, 2013

Woman's tragedy speaks to Indian aspirations

It's common these days for people to compare India with China and conclude that maybe democracy isn't all it's cracked up to be.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 23, 2013

How the Vietnam war will shape Obama's second term

The men who fought in Vietnam, a war that symbolizes America's overreach and failures abroad, haven't ascended to the presidency in the way that the World War II generation did. But now, under President Barack Obama, Vietnam veterans Chuck Hagel and John Kerry could get a chance to pull America back...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 23, 2013

Pakistan's democracy weathering the storms

Since mid-December, Pakistan has experienced political and economic volatility that is extraordinary even by Pakistani standards. The fragile political structure that began to be erected following the resumption of civilian government in 2008 is now shaking.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Jan 23, 2013

New Osaka coach Cartwright brings major credibility

"I remember when I was in college, people told me I couldn't play in the NBA. There's always somebody saying you can't do it, and those people have to be ignored."
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Jan 21, 2013

German gun owners quiet as national firearms registry starts

Imagine a vast registry that details every legal gun owner in the country, along with information about all of their firearms.
EDITORIALS
Jan 21, 2013

An appalling waste of food

An alarming new report estimates that between 30 and 50 percent of all the food produced in the world is lost and wasted. This is a shocking finding given the scale of malnourishment and hunger on our planet.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / Japan Pulse
Jan 20, 2013

Hit the road: Japan's 2013 trend forecast

In 2012 we got cat-ear hair-dos, an increasing appetite for salty mold, and a tower with a silly name. What wonders will 2013 bring? We’ve gone through Trendy’s predictions and came up with a list of themes that look good to us. Basically it boils down to this: smart phones continue to up the convenience...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
Jan 20, 2013

Veteran athletes, coaches adamant that corporal punishment has no place in sports

The tragic death of a 17-year-old Osaka high school student and basketball captain in December sheds light on a disturbing aspect of Japanese culture that has existed for decades: corporal punishment.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 19, 2013

Fukushima's powder paradise

I seem to have the whole mountain to myself. The vast majesty of Fukushima Prefecture spreads out below me, all around. Up here, skiing on powdery snow, zigzagging through challenging moguls, it's easy to forget about the nuclear reactors 120 km away.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 19, 2013

Beating kids to create 'fighting spirit' in sport doesn't translate

In a recent interview on the Barnes & Noble Review website promoting his latest book, historian Jared Diamond mentions how treatment of the young "varies among traditional societies just as it varies among industrial societies," and gives examples of how some of the former use corporal punishment for...
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Jan 19, 2013

Saudi treatment of foreign maids comes under fire

More than 45 foreign maids are facing execution on death row in Saudi Arabia amid growing international outrage at the treatment of migrant workers.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 19, 2013

Why spider's silk is becoming man's best friend

Up on the roof of professor Fritz Vollrath's lab in the zoology department at Oxford University, there is a makeshift greenhouse in which he nurtures his favorite golden orb web spiders. Walking into the greenhouse is a little like finding yourself inside one of those Damien Hirst vitrines that dramatize...
Japan Times
WORLD
Jan 17, 2013

Kids' role in U.S. gun debate disputed

The move by the White House on Wednesday to feature four children at President Barack Obama's gun-control news conference set into motion a new debate over the role of young people on the political stage.
WORLD
Jan 17, 2013

Police pepper coffin-carrying protesters with tear gas

Peshawar Pakistan AFP-JIJI
EDITORIALS
Jan 17, 2013

Drug sales over the Internet

The Supreme Court's Second Petit Bench ruled 4-0 on Jan. 11 that the health and welfare ministry's ban on the sale of nonprescription drugs over the Internet is null and void. Two firms had filed the lawsuit. While maximum priority should be given to drug safety, a balance must be struck between safety...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 17, 2013

Moscow's not-so-friendly environmental quirks

Moscow, they say, "wasn't built at one go" — in contrast to St. Petersburg, which emerged laid out, as if by magic, in strict conformity to Peter the Great's plan — and it has been growing chaotically for more than 800 years on seven gently sloping hills surrounding the river of the same name.

Longform

Figure skater Akiko Suzuki was once told her ideal weight should be 47 kilograms, a number she now admits she “naively believed.” This led to her have a relationship with food that resulted in her suffering from anorexia.
The silent battle Japanese athletes fight with weight