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Japan Times
JAPAN / POWERING THE FUTURE
Sep 24, 2011

Despite headwinds, solar energy making progress, advocates say

Japan's largest solar panel plant is in full swing in Kunitomi, Miyazaki Prefecture, daily churning out up to 16,000 30-sq.-cm solar panels that have a conversion efficiency rate of more than 12 percent.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Sep 24, 2011

Wenger needs to get a grip before season is a total loss

The reporter from the Middle East newspaper could not have expected the Sir Alex Ferguson hair dryer-type response from Arsene Wenger.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 24, 2011

Amore mio, Aomori

With reconstruction underway and tourism returning to northern Japan, Aomori Prefecture is once again a viable tourist destination. You can ride the Hayabusa (not the space probe, but the bullet train) and probe northern Japan. As the new bullet train pierces the northernmost reaches of Honshu, to me,...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 23, 2011

The energy for trilateral ties

The Japan-U.S.-Australia trilateral relationship looks great on paper. Three major democracies and advanced economies in the Asia-Pacific region, geographically distant but sharing numerous common values and interests.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 23, 2011

Actress Kaho Minami on speaking without words

Kaho Minami has had a busy and varied career as an actress since her 1985 debut in Kohei Oguri's "Kayako no Tameni" ("For Kayoko"). In addition to appearing in everything from commercial hits (Takashi Miike's "Yokai Daisenso [The Great Yokai War]," 2005) to films with leading indie directors (Jun Ichikawa,...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 21, 2011

Raise cigarette tax to cover medical costs: health chief

Tobacco taxes should be raised until the average price for a pack of cigarettes is about ¥700, or 75 percent more than the present level, to cut medical costs, according to health minister Yoko Komiyama.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Sep 18, 2011

Carp's Sarfate keeps focus on game, not records

In 2010, it was Hanshin Tigers outfielder Matt Murton who broke the Japanese baseball record for most hits in a season when he banged out 214 safeties in his first year playing in the country.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / ONE-ON-ONE WITH ...
Sep 18, 2011

Energetic leader Nakamura looks to build special team in Akita

The Japan Times features periodic interviews with personalities in the bj-league. Coach Kazuo Nakamura of the Akita Northern Happinets is the subject of this week's profile.
JAPAN
Sep 16, 2011

Mainali's kin submit retrial request

The wife and brother of Govinda Prasad Mainali, a Nepalese man serving life in prison for the 1997 robbery-murder of a 39-year-old woman, on Thursday called for his immediate release and demanded a retrial be held to prove his innocence.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CABINET INTERVIEW
Sep 16, 2011

Despite pyramid sales donations, new consumer chief vows to run tight ship

Newly appointed consumer affairs chief Kenji Yamaoka says he will keep an eye on shady businesses that target consumers, while claiming that donations he received from businesses and a group involved in a pyramid scheme were legal.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 15, 2011

Will the real Dick Cheney please stand up?

He's been called Darth Vader, feared or derided as a trigger-happy, torture-loving puppet master who called the shots over the eight years of the George W. Bush presidency. And now, with the publication of his memoir, "In My Time," Dick Cheney has once again grabbed the media spotlight. But what about...
BUSINESS
Sep 15, 2011

Toyota says its parts woes are 'behind us'

Toyota Motor Corp. resumed full production at all North American plants this week and said it will expand U.S. output of small engines as Japan's largest automaker works to boost sales slowed by a March earthquake.
SOCCER / J. League / J. LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Sep 15, 2011

Front four jostle for position heading into final stretch

It is all but certain that the 2011 J. League champion will come from the four-team breakaway group that has formed at the top of the table, but with a quarter of the season still to play, that is about as clear as the picture gets.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 15, 2011

"Matthew Herbert"

Matthew Herbert can hardly be called a one-trick pony. Leaving his background in classical violin early on in his career, he has traversed many genres of dance music with his Doctor Rockit, Wishmountain and Herbert aliases. He has also conducted his own jazz big band and scored films and dance productions....
CULTURE / Books
Sep 11, 2011

The Russians are coming!

SATORI, by Don Winslow. Grand Central Publishing, 2011, 548 pp., $7.99 (paper) 9 GOLD BULLETS, by Christopher G. Moore. Heaven Lake Press, 2011, 365 pp., $14.95 (paper) Readers of mystery and thriller fiction can be extremely loyal and publishers, knowing this, sometimes arrange to bring fictional characters...
EDITORIALS
Sep 9, 2011

Japan rules the Senkakus

One year after the Senkaku incident, Japanese and Chinese people have a bad impression of each other, despite deepening economic and trade relations between the two countries. In fact, China is Japan's No. 1 trade partner. In this situation, the Japanese government must act coolheadedly toward China...
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Sep 7, 2011

Grandma got game: More elderly patronizing arcades

Game arcades are counting on the elderly to turn around their business fortunes.
EDITORIALS
Sep 7, 2011

With record rains comes misery

Typhoon No. 12 (Talas) has brought heavy rains mainly in western Japan. As of the night of Sept. 5, 37 people had died and 54 others were missing. Among the typhoons that hit Japan since 1989, when the Heisei Era started, the latest one caused the second largest number of deaths and missing victims,...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 7, 2011

Refusal to talk threatens Suzuki-VW tieup

A tiff that started over Volkswagen AG's description of Suzuki Motor Corp. in its annual report has escalated into a spat threatening to unravel the two automakers' planned alliance before the partnership ever gets going.
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Sep 6, 2011

'Sexlessness' wrecks marriages, threatens nation's future

In its cover story last month, The Economist newsmagazine looked at the issue of "Asia's lonely hearts: Why Asian women are rejecting marriage and what that means." It offered many reasons — including economics, education level, changes in family structures and gender roles, divorce difficulties, and...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Sep 3, 2011

Murray aims for change in Saitama

The Saitama Broncos have been a part of the bj-league's history since the beginning.
COMMENTARY
Sep 2, 2011

U.S.-China 'win-win' game

In spite of the polar positions of the United States and China in the global system, during the past dozen years their economies have become intertwined to such a degree that one is tempted to speak of an emerging new giant macroeconomic entity with a common metabolism — at least with regard to some...

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