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COMMENTARY
Sep 5, 2004

Japan-China mind games

HONOLULU -- Two weeks in China have left me concerned about future relations between Japan and China. A smooth and cooperative Japan-China relationship is essential to regional peace, stability and prosperity. Yet increasing interaction at just about every level of the relationship has generated many...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 31, 2004

Eight-day extraordinary Diet session opens

The Diet opened Friday for an extraordinary session that will run for eight days until Aug. 6, as decided by the ruling bloc.
COMMENTARY
Jul 26, 2004

Beijing entering Hong Kong cul-de-sac

HONG KONG -- On July 1, Hong Kong, figuratively speaking, stuck to its democratic guns. It was just as well since China, naturally, has stuck to its antidemocratic guns.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 21, 2004

Indonesian voters showing their savvy

SINGAPORE -- Results of the first round of Indonesia's presidential election on July 5 indicate that the electorate has grown more sophisticated than many observers had expected -- only six years since the country emerged from decades of authoritarianism.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 20, 2004

Former Prime Minister Suzuki dies at Tokyo hospital, aged 93

Former Prime Minister Zenko Suzuki died at a Tokyo hospital Monday, his family said. He was 93.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 13, 2004

EU leaders face voters' wrath

LONDON -- George Orwell once called soccer a substitute for war. Looking at the recently finished European Championship held in Lisbon, one might well call it a political metaphor. What happened on the pitch during the monthlong tournament was an uncanny reflection of what is happening on a wider and...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 12, 2004

Pension reform, SDF weigh on voters' minds

If anything, Sunday's House of Councilors election will probably be remembered for the clarity of the issues voters were being called on to judge.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 6, 2004

Expressway debts: New policy goes on the road to nowhere

By passing expressway legislation that omitted a key part of privatization panel's suggestions, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's political 'style' may now be under scrutiny by politicians and the general public.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jul 6, 2004

Expressway debts: New policy goes on the road to nowhere

By passing expressway legislation that omitted a key part of privatization panel's suggestions, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's political 'style' may now be under scrutiny by politicians and the general public.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 20, 2004

Popular return of a dynasty

It is generally accepted in India and abroad that, in the changed political landscape of India, Sonia Gandhi is the power behind the scenes. She is the convener of the ruling multiparty alliance. Her son Rahul Gandhi, a new member of Parliament from the "family" seat of Amethi in northern India (which...
COMMENTARY
Jun 5, 2004

Filipino politicians just don't like to lose

MANILA -- For the international media, the Philippine elections are a done deal, since the head of the Commission on Elections in an all but orthodox manner unofficially let it be known that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo beat her main contender, ex-movie star Fernando Poe Jr., by more than 900,000...
COMMENTARY / World
May 28, 2004

New democracy masters coalition-building

HONG KONG -- Ironically, at a time when the United States is trying to bring instant democracy to the Middle East, Indonesia, the largest Muslim nation in the world, is undergoing a complex, three-tiered democratic election virtually unnoticed.
COMMENTARY
May 17, 2004

Get pension reform on track

A leading Cabinet member and the top opposition leader have been forced to resign for failing to make compulsory premium payments, at one time or another, into the national pension program.
COMMENTARY / World
May 14, 2004

Controversies stoke Chinese nationalism

SINGAPORE -- Controversy in Taiwan over the March 20 presidential poll as well as political stirrings in Hong Kong over China's "final" say in deciding reforms have probably contributed to rising nationalism in China. These three trends could affect the future development of China and the stability of...
COMMENTARY
May 4, 2004

Blair's hard sell of a new EU

LONDON -- "It's ghastly," Chris Patten, the last governor of Hong Kong, said with a shudder. He was speaking of the referendum -- that Prime Minister Tony Blair has declared, after no consultation with his Cabinet, will now be held -- on the draft EU constitution. Why is a referendum ghastly? Because,...
EDITORIALS
Apr 28, 2004

Back to the future in Indonesia

The first round of voting in Indonesia's electoral pageant has revealed a wave of nostalgia for the past. Golkar, the party of disgraced former leader Suharto, came out on top in national parliamentary elections in early April. Days after the results were announced, Golkar picked Mr. Wiranto, a former...
JAPAN
Apr 19, 2004

Nosaka, key part of SDP-LDP bloc of '90s, dead at 79

Koken Nosaka, a former Social Democratic Party lawmaker who served as chief Cabinet secretary in 1995 and 1996, died Sunday of kidney failure at a hospital in Yonago, Tottori Prefecture, his family said. He was 79.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Apr 4, 2004

Robert Whiting: Outside the box

Back in 1972, a 30-year-old New Jersey native who had recently graduated from Tokyo's Sophia University was in New York City, trying to talk to anyone who would listen about politics and life in Japan. Nobody was interested.
EDITORIALS
Mar 30, 2004

A test for Taiwan's democracy

Ten days after Taiwan's presidential election yielded a contested result, there are signs of progress in resolving the political crisis it created. The winner of the vote, President Chen Shui-bian, last weekend promised a recount to defuse mounting tensions. The recount is a vital step in sorting out...
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...
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...
EDITORIALS
Mar 25, 2004

A bullet tips Taiwan's ballot

Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian won last weekend's national election by a sliver. A mysterious assassination attempt on the eve of the ballot may have provided the margin of victory. The protests and charges of misconduct that followed the announcement of the results were predictable. It will take time...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 24, 2004

Prince of Darkness

Why did Melt Banana, a local avant-punk band, open for Bonnie "Prince" Billy on his first-ever concert tour of Japan. Simple: Melt Banana like the music of Will Oldham, the man behind the moniker, and wanted to be part of his final show at O'Nest in Shibuya.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Mar 7, 2004

Yayoi Kusama: Lost and found in art

Yayoi Kusama was just shy of 30 when she left her hometown of Matsumoto in Nagano Prefecture and headed to America to meet her hero, the painter Georgia O'Keeffe.
COMMENTARY
Mar 3, 2004

Secret operations rock Blair's boat

LONDON -- From the moment Tony Blair let it be known that he had decided to send troops to Iraq, his days of smooth government were over. The decision unleashed all the dark forces of suspicion and a sense of illegality that are usually contained by democratic institutions. As the prime minister battles...
JAPAN
Feb 21, 2004

Diet dean Yamanaka, LDP's sales tax champion, dies at 82

Liberal Democratic Party heavyweight Sadanori Yamanaka, who influenced the nation's tax policies in the 1980s as a champion for the consumption tax, died Friday at Juntendo University Hospital in Tokyo. He was 82.
JAPAN
Feb 13, 2004

SDP's Tsujimoto handed suspended term

The Tokyo District Court on Thursday sentenced Kiyomi Tsujimoto, former policy chief of the Social Democratic Party, to a suspended two-year prison term for defrauding the state out of 18.7 million yen.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Feb 11, 2004

Dreams with wings

Last month, Brooklyn-born director Robert Allan Ackerman was in New York for the prestigious Golden Globe Awards, for which he had nominations for his TV movie of Tennessee Williams' "The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone" and his TV miniseries, "The Reagans," which CBS refused to screen. This month he is in...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 11, 2004

More than transformation to a photo critic's eye

THE HISTORY OF JAPANESE PHOTOGRAPHY, edited and translated by John Junkerman. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003, 404 pp. $65 (cloth). The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, deserves kudos for sponsoring this superb slab of a book. This is certainly an impressively organized, thoughtful and comprehensive...

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years