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JAPAN / Politics
Aug 30, 2013

Cabinet weighs stance if U.S. hits Syria without U.N. nod

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet is mulling how to respond to a possible U.S.-led military strike against Syria without authorization from the United Nations Security Council.
ENVIRONMENT
Aug 30, 2013

Smokestack emissions could produce energy

If pollution had a mascot, it would be the smokestack. Do a Google image search for "pollution." What do you see? A bunch of smokestacks with ominous gray clouds billowing out the top.
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Aug 30, 2013

Black-white economic gap in U.S. is still as wide as ever

When President Barack Obama spoke at the Lincoln Memorial on Wednesday to commemorate the 1963 March on Washington, he symbolized part of the complicated story of America's racial progress in the past half a century. Can there be more convincing testimony to the breathtaking advancement of African-Americans...
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Aug 30, 2013

Ex-BBC host Harris charged in U.K.

Rolf Harris, an Australian entertainer, was charged as part of a U.K. police probe into sexual-assault allegations.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 29, 2013

Government must take over Fukushima nuclear cleanup

It is literally a matter of national security that the decommissiong of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant be taken over by the government with the assistance of an international task force of experts.
EDITORIALS
Aug 29, 2013

Wrong reason to rescind censorship

Society must give children a chance to think deeply about war and other serious issues by allowing them unhindered access to relevant literature in school.
CULTURE / Film
Aug 29, 2013

Snyder ponders Superman's ultimate dilemma

Opening on the heels of that other summer blockbuster "Star Trek Into Darkness," "Man of Steel" is no smaller in scale but feels much more personal. That's probably because director Zack Snyder ("300," "Sucker Punch") is a hands-on kind of filmmaker, who secretly feels that if he can't stamp his personality...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Aug 29, 2013

Japan's love affair with Chekhov

"I have rarely seen a great production of any Chekhov play in Japan. Sometimes, I've even wanted to ask how they managed to make them so tedious."
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health
Aug 29, 2013

Stressed expats need, but oft sidestep real help: therapist

Many expatriates who face problems adjusting to the cultural differences of Japan tend to abuse alcohol and other drugs to deal with the stress of the transition, according to a Polish psychologist and therapist who counsels foreign residents in Japan.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 29, 2013

Prius to get boost from new battery upgrades

Toyota Motor Corp., whose Prius dominates the market for hybrid vehicles, said its next generation of batteries will be more efficient and improve mileage.
Reader Mail
Aug 28, 2013

'Gainsaying' by no man's leave

Father Peter Milward, in his Aug. 22 letter, "Legacy of Christian humanism," would appear to have no idea what I'm talking about.
Reader Mail
Aug 28, 2013

Encounters of the foreign kind

Chavez's article left me with mixed feelings. Living in foreign countries, everybody will have certainly felt that he or she is supposed to be discriminated against to some extent, but according to Chavez and the opinions of my foreign friends, they tend to feel this way more often in Japan than in other...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 28, 2013

Asia's real problem is boosterism, not Fed policy

Asia has come a long way since 1997. But rapid growth and its unquestioned success in surviving the global meltdown has revived a hubris that policymakers need to own and analyze.
WORLD / Science & Health / FOCUS
Aug 28, 2013

Air gun noise sparks alarm in war over offshore drilling

The use of "seismic air guns" to determine how much oil and gas lies beneath a vast swath of the ocean floor off the southeast coast of the United States is provoking an early skirmish in a battle over oil drilling that is still years away.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 28, 2013

Gaffe-shy Hashimoto keeps media at bay

With a critical local election looming, Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Party) co-leader and Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto declares that a fundraising event and strategy session Friday will be closed to the media.
EDITORIALS
Aug 27, 2013

Reducing food loss

More than 30 Japanese food companies, wholesalers and convenient store chains are testing a way to reduce 'food loss' caused by strict obeisance to expiration dates.
LIFE / Digital
Aug 27, 2013

Banish trolls but the Net needs anonymity

So the proprietor of the Huffington Post has decided to ban anonymous commenting from the site, starting in mid-September. Speaking to reporters after a conference in Boston, Massachusetts, Arianna Huffington said: "Trolls are just getting more and more aggressive and uglier and I just came from London...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 27, 2013

Power is fragmenting, but what is the true cost?

Political parties are succumbing to the rise of uncompromising single-issue pressure groups, and the corresponding decline of supporters who want common values expressed.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Aug 27, 2013

Girl-recruiting teacher in hot water

Police have handed prosecutors their case against a 59-year-old Iwate University professor who arranged for four foreign students to work as part-time nightclub hostesses.
Japan Times
WORLD
Aug 27, 2013

Chemical attack weakens drive to destroy world stockpiles

The shelling of suburban Damascus with a suspected nerve agent last week was potentially the third large-scale use of a chemical weapon in the Middle East and may have broken the longest period in history without such an attack.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics / ANALYSIS
Aug 27, 2013

Slew of arrests in China show Xi is consolidating his power

The trial of Bo Xilai may have divided the Chinese Communist Party and hogged the media spotlight, but, outside the courtroom, President Xi Jinping is continuing his steady efforts to consolidate control, clean up the party and sideline opponents, with a series of detentions and arrests.
JAPAN
Aug 27, 2013

'Whack-a-mole' Tepco can't cut it, so state steps in

The government will lead "emergency measures" to combat the radioactive water leaks at the wrecked Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, wresting control of the disaster recovery from the besieged Tokyo Electric Power Co.
COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Aug 26, 2013

Plugging Tepco's brain drain

One reason Tepco paid a uniform ¥100,000 special summer bonus to each of some 5,000 managerial employees is to plug a brain drain. Core workers are quitting.
EDITORIALS
Aug 26, 2013

Poisoned mongooses in Okinawa

Japanese researchers have detected high levels of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in mongooses found near two U.S. military bases in Okinawa.
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Aug 26, 2013

Of nuclear village idiots and radiation scare-mongerers: letters

Nab Tepco execs, take over the clean-up

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