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JAPAN
Apr 1, 2004

Temporary magazine sales ban threatens freedom of expression

The Tokyo District Court's temporary injunction banning the sale of the weekly Shukan Bunshun over an article about the private life of a Diet lawmaker's daughter triggered debate over the issue of privacy vs. freedom of expression.
JAPAN
Apr 1, 2004

High court rescinds weekly's injunction

The Tokyo High Court on Wednesday revoked a lower court injunction against the publication of a magazine that carried a story on the divorce of former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka's daughter, citing freedom of expression and the public's right to know.
Events
Mar 31, 2004

South Korean economy bedeviled by serious woes: writers

While Japan's economy may finally be bidding farewell to the "lost decade" of the stagnant 1990s, growth in South Korea, once noted for its rapid recovery after the 1997 Asian crisis, is slowing down amid serious problems like mounting household debts.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Mar 31, 2004

Diamondbacks Day still a feature at Tokyo Dome

The Pacific League Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters will hold their third annual Arizona Diamondbacks Day promotion on Sunday, April 18, at the Tokyo Dome. Diamondbacks Day is held so the Nippon Ham team can honor the National League club (its working partner), and the Fighters ball club is inviting 3,000...
COMMENTARY
Mar 31, 2004

Madrid attack redefines EU

LONDON -- The bomb outrage and mass slaughter of train commuters in Madrid on March 11 has changed the face of European politics in more ways than one.
JAPAN
Mar 30, 2004

Ministry aids foreign journalists

The Foreign Ministry called on public offices Monday to ensure that accredited foreign journalists are permitted to attend news conferences.
JAPAN
Mar 30, 2004

Deadly door's sensor was set at 135 cm

The sensor system of the automatic revolving door that crushed a 6-year-old boy to death Friday in Tokyo's Roppongi Hills complex had been adjusted upward to respond only to objects standing 135 cm or higher, police sources said Monday.
EDITORIALS
Mar 29, 2004

Letting foreign workers past the gate

One aspect of globalization is freer employment across national borders, including Japan's borders. Although foreigners are increasingly becoming important members of the nation's labor force, by and large, the job market here remains effectively closed to them. Yet foreign employment looks set for a...
JAPAN / TALKING SHOP
Mar 29, 2004

Wipro head develops management style to handle Indians

YOKOHAMA -- Masaki Nagao recently applied a typical Japanese business practice to helping reorganize his India-affiliated software firm here.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 28, 2004

History behind a rocky democracy

INDONESIAN DESTINIES, by Theodore Friend. Cambridge: Belknap/Harvard University Press, 2003, 628 pp., $35 (cloth). INDONESIA: People and Histories, by Jean Gelman Taylor. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003, 420 pp., $39.95 (cloth). These two books complement each other nicely and contribute greatly...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 28, 2004

A subversive sampler of the future

Since the '80s -- when the first samplers came on the market -- sampling in music has evolved from a revolutionary and barely understood practice to become a standard tool in the production of even the most mundane pop song. It's all in the hands of the user -- and when those hands belong to Coldcut,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 28, 2004

Filling in the template for a changing Cambodia

CAMBODIA, by Michael Freeman. London: Reaktion Books, 2004, 198 pp., 43 color photographs, £19.95 (paper). With Angkor as its capital, the Khmer empire ruled over what is now central and southern Vietnam, southern Laos, Thailand and part of the Malay Peninsula. Now dwindled to Cambodia, Angkor's colossal...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 27, 2004

Tony Blair loses his touch

LONDON -- When he led the reformed British Labour Party to two overwhelming general election victories in 1997 and 2001, Tony Blair epitomized a new political generation that would sweep away both the cobwebs of traditional socialist policy and the increasingly incoherent, sleaze-tainted performance...
JAPAN
Mar 26, 2004

Subway commuters overcharged

Teito Rapid Transit Authority said Thursday it overcharged passengers who used its fare adjustment machines under certain conditions for about one year due to a programming error.
EDITORIALS
Mar 26, 2004

Last resort to protect privacy

Over the past two weeks Japanese media have made much of a privacy issue involving the eldest daughter of former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka. It all started with an article in a popular weekly describing the daughter's private life. Responding to a request from her lawyer, the Tokyo District Court...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 26, 2004

Recycling law spurs sales of used PCs

Sellers of used personal computers are enjoying brisk trade, partly because consumers are now required by law to spend several thousand yen on sending PCs they no longer need back to manufacturers.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 26, 2004

Justice system a vehicle for order -- or revenge?

Nearly five years after four teenagers murdered his son, 53-year-old Mitsuo Sudo has gone public about his grief, and his beef with the criminal justice system.
JAPAN
Mar 26, 2004

Magazine publisher defends article on Tanaka's daughter

Tokyo-based publisher Bungeishunju Ltd. said Thursday its controversial article about former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka's daughter contributed to the public good.
BUSINESS
Mar 25, 2004

Resona Bank set to sell Cosmo shares to CSK

Resona Holdings Inc. is in the final stages of talks with CSK Corp. over the sale of a major part of the group's equity stake in Cosmo Securities Co., the company said Wednesday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 25, 2004

Discrimination's blatant signs, not roots, easy target

A few years ago, lawsuits by foreigners against businesses that barred their entry gained public attention, and while the litigation may have faded from memory, not so the discrimination they fought -- just see the signs.
JAPAN
Mar 24, 2004

Rice harvested by children to be donated to Cambodia

The U.N. World Food Program and a Japanese nongovernmental organization will ship to Cambodia 32 tons of rice harvested by children in Japan to help poor women and children in developing nations.
JAPAN
Mar 23, 2004

Top court loses Lockheed records

The Supreme Court no longer possesses official documents on the 1970s payoff involving Lockheed Corp. and then Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka, court officials said Monday.
JAPAN
Mar 23, 2004

Instability hampers assistance, business

Whenever the government or Diet discusses the security situation in Iraq, it is usually related to the safety of the Ground Self-Defense Force troops deployed to the southern Iraqi city of Samawah.
COMMENTARY
Mar 22, 2004

BBC still plays a vital role

LONDON -- The British Broadcasting Corporation has one of the longest and respectable histories among the world's public-service broadcasting organizations. Since its establishment in the 1920s, it has built up an enviable reputation for independence and reliability.
Japan Times
Features
Mar 21, 2004

One of a kind

The year was 1841. Japan was still the closed country it had been for two centuries by order of the feudal Tokugawa Shogunate; for a Japanese to go abroad, or return from abroad, were capital offenses. The arrival of U.S. Commodore Matthew C. Perry's four black-hulled steamships in Edo Bay -- and the...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Mar 21, 2004

'Mister' is a god, but he's not immortal

Former Village Voice media critic Tom Carson once wrote an essay in which he blasted the style imperative subscribed to by American men's magazines. These publications had invested so heavily in a certain male image that they couldn't imagine anything else. "You want to strike terror in the hearts of...

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