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EDITORIALS
Aug 16, 2001

Rome's unseemly retreat

Determined to avoid another bloody fiasco like last month's Group of Eight summit in Genoa, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has asked the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization to move the World Food Summit, which is scheduled to be held in November in Rome, to Africa. That would be a mistake:...
COMMENTARY
Aug 16, 2001

Missed chance at Yasukuni

Japan's neighbors are expressing great indignation over Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Aug. 13 visit to the Yasukuni Shrine, where the spirits of 14 convicted World War II war criminals are enshrined among some 2.5 million of Japan's war dead over the past two centuries. His decision to go early,...
JAPAN
Aug 16, 2001

Koizumi makes amity pledge at annual surrender day rites

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi pledged that Japan will never again isolate itself from the world but will seek only amity with its neighbors, during a secular ceremony Wednesday marking the 56th anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender.
JAPAN
Aug 16, 2001

Ikeda school gets new building after June stabbings

OSAKA -- The elementary school in Ikeda, Osaka Prefecture, where eight children were fatally stabbed in June, completed construction of a temporary schoolhouse Wednesday for the resumption of classes this month.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 16, 2001

World Games 2001 open in Akita

Who is the best lifesaver in the world? Who is the most elegant performer at a height of 3,000 meters? And who throws a flying disc the most accurately?
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Aug 16, 2001

Slow and steady wins the dispersal race

Humans have an anthropocentric tendency to look down on "cold-blooded" reptiles. We even use the term "cold-blooded" in a derogatory way to criticize people who seem somehow less than human.
EDITORIALS
Aug 14, 2001

Mr. Koizumi's poor choice

In disregard of opposition at home and abroad, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi paid a controversial visit to Yasukuni Shrine on Monday, two days before the Aug. 15 anniversary of Japan's defeat in World War II. By avoiding going on Wednesday, the date originally planned, Mr. Koizumi apparently tried...
BUSINESS
Aug 14, 2001

An 'A' for Failure

By Mark McCormack A visit to an Ivy League college to attend the graduation of his son bore an unexpected dividend for one of our agents. He was so taken by one of the speakers, a mathematics professor, that he approached him afterward about doing a book. It was an excellent example of maximizing the...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 12, 2001

'Model' family vs. maternal love: a nation judges

Last week, the Japan Office of the Nevada Center for Reproductive Medicine announced that a 60-year-old Japanese woman gave birth to a healthy baby at Jikei University Hospital in Tokyo. Though the woman's identity and the child's gender were not revealed, the mother released a statement through the...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Aug 12, 2001

War and remembrance

This Wednesday marks the 56th anniversary of the Japanese surrender, but, as usual, only NHK is commemorating it in any significant way.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 12, 2001

Til death or demographics do us part: the changing face of family life in Japan

At the end of each year, NHK has a ritual contest of male singers vs. female singers, but signs have been emerging of more serious gender conflict on the horizon in Japan. The diverging interests of men and women are evident in a recent book on changing attitudes toward having children and an article...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 12, 2001

She's got legs . . .

You've probably seen her somewhere -- on product packaging, in fashion catalogs or TV commercials. But no one would recognize her, because she is famous only for her legs.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 11, 2001

Playing chicken with telecommunication big boys

To some he is a hero. To others an anathema. For this writer, who lives in trepidation of meeting with Japanese CEOs because (sorry guys) they tend to be so predictable, Sachio Semmoto is a breath of fresh air.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 11, 2001

In South Asian taxis, chaos is the rule

It's summer vacation, when many of you will find yourselves clinging to the inside of taxis in South Asian countries as the drivers try to get you to someplace like your hotel as fast as possible, as if it will get up and move to another location any moment. The result is you get the life scared out...
JAPAN
Aug 11, 2001

Authorities forced to slash water intake

Record-breaking temperatures and scant rainfall have prompted authorities across the nation to cut water intake, with the government warning that water shortages in the Kanto, Chubu and Shikoku areas could match those during Japan's worst recorded drought eight years ago.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2001

Yasukuni awaits as minefield for Koizumi

and TOSHI MAEDA Staff writers One might wonder why Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is so bent on visiting Yasukuni Shrine on Aug. 15, the anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender, amid a steady outcry from Seoul and Beijing and opposition from inside his ruling camp.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2001

ITU chief wants body policy savvy

Yoshio Utsumi is struggling to change the International Telecommunication Union, the world's oldest international organization whose origin dates back to 1865.
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2001

41% of those in their 60s use mobiles

Forty-one percent of people in their 60s living in the Tokyo metropolitan area have mobile phones and many also use mobile e-mail and special ringing melodies, according to a survey released Thursday by NTT DoCoMo Inc.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Aug 9, 2001

Times get tougher for Bush

WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush has now been in the Oval Office for a little more than one half year, and it has been the best of times and the worst of times for him.
JAPAN
Aug 9, 2001

145 arrested over election violations

A total of 145 people have been arrested for suspected election law violations in connection with the July 29 House of Councilors poll, the National Police Agency said Wednesday.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Aug 9, 2001

Injunction process hopeless; fate of Bullfrog Pond sealed

The fate of Bullfrog Pond now rests in the hands of a Tokyo District Court judge, but the wheels of justice turn slowly in Japan. The court has yet to grant a crucial injunction, and hearings have dragged into their third month. Meantime, the pond in Tokyo's Minato Ward, known as Gama-ike, is being destroyed....
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2001

Chinese writer heads drive to build schools in Asia, Africa

After graduating from Shanghai's Fudan University, studying Japanese at Tokyo's Takushoku University and history at the University of Tokyo, Chinese writer Ye Qing is now leading a drive to construct elementary schools in Asia and Africa.
JAPAN
Aug 7, 2001

Japanese prosthesis maker finds her calling in Rwanda

As Rwandan swimmer Cesar Rwagasana strode into the Sydney stadium during the opening ceremony of last year's Paralympic Games, he was closely followed by Mami Yoshida, the woman who helped him walk again.
JAPAN / STAGING A COMEBACK
Aug 7, 2001

Businesses bustle to board biotech bandwagon

With the mapping of the human genome opening the door to new possibilities for curing diseases and developing medicine, many Japanese companies are running to catch the bandwagon for the emerging biotech business.
Events
Aug 7, 2001

Privatizing nursery schools irks Takaishi parents group

TAKAISHI, Osaka Pref. -- With Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi making vague noises on the importance of education, this city of 62,000 people is realizing that words alone aren't the answer.
JAPAN
Aug 5, 2001

Dual-surname system gaining support

Those in favor of permitting married couples to have different surnames far outnumber those opposing it, according to a government survey released Saturday.

Longform

Koichi Tagawa’s diary entry from Aug. 9, 1945, describes the day of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
The horrors of Nagasaki, in first person