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COMMENTARY
Jun 2, 2003

U.S.-Japan global alliance

Last week's summit between Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and U.S. President George W. Bush ushered in a new era for the Japan-U.S. security alliance: The bilateral system is beginning to change into a global alliance.
COMMENTARY
May 19, 2003

Strengthen Japan's deterrent

The ruling coalition and the top opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, have agreed to amend a package of government-sponsored war contingency bills, marking a turning point in Japan's security policy.
BUSINESS
Jan 10, 2003

Aozora chief angry over allegation

Aozora Bank confirmed a media report Thursday that it provided customer information to U.S. investment fund Cerberus Group, one of its top shareholders, on request between January and February 2002.
BUSINESS
Nov 28, 2002

Bills for splitting public entities pass

The Diet passed nine bills Wednesday to convert designated special-purpose public corporations, including the National Consumer Affairs Center of Japan, into nine independent administrative entities.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 18, 2002

Kim admits abductions

PYONGYANG -- Four of the 11 Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea in the 1970s and '80s are alive but six others are dead, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il told Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi during their landmark talks on Tuesday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 1, 2002

U.N. official seeks debt forgiveness, more aid for poorest African nations

While Japan is striving to reduce its official development assistance budget, it should channel more aid resources toward least developed countries in Africa, according to a high-ranking U.N. official.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 9, 2002

In publishing, the modern girls have it

World Cup fever may have taken over the Japanese media, but the bookstores are full of books on language and education. The sales of books for learning English are perhaps connected to spring and its association in Japan with the beginning of the academic year and the hiring of new employees by the corporate...
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 1, 2002

Make the world a better place for children

From May 8 to 10, the streets of New York City were adorned by the presence of 60 heads of state and their bodyguards, 3,000 government officials, 3,000 nongovernmental organizations and children from 180 countries. They were delegates of the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Children,...
Japan Times
JAPAN / THE OKINAWA FACTOR
May 15, 2002

Nuclear pact ensured smooth Okinawa reversion

On Nov. 21, 1969, President Richard Nixon met with Prime Minister Eisaku Sato in Washington to discuss an extremely delicate issue.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 14, 2002

Noam Chomsky: America is a leading terrorist state

CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts -- Noam Chomsky, a linguistics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is world-famous as the originator of the "Transformational Grammar" theory, a framework of principles accounting for all language-specific rules.
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Mar 5, 2002

Deciding who has the right to life

DUBLIN -- A familiar sight once again adorns lampposts and billboards in every town and village in Ireland. The posters scream conflicting messages to a confused public: "Babies will die, vote no"; "Protect women and save babies, vote yes."
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Feb 14, 2002

Vinatieri deserved Super Bowl MVP

The sports media blew it again last week.
JAPAN
Feb 11, 2002

Shonan merger plan races clock, though some balk

With its gently arching coastline overlooking Enoshima Island in Sagami Bay and a distant view of Mount Fuji and the Hakone mountain range, the Shonan area in Kanagawa Prefecture triggers memories of songs and movies about the picturesque area.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 16, 2001

Bringing young and old together

GENERATIONS IN TOUCH: Linking the Old and Young in a Tokyo Neighborhood, by Leng Leng Thang. Cornell University Press, 2001, 209 pp., paper ($39.95) As Japan's traditional three-generation households go nuclear and fewer young couples have children, the care of the nation's elderly has become an increasingly...
JAPAN
Dec 15, 2001

Japan to cohost global conference on child sexual exploitation

Japan will cohost an international conference in Yokohama next week to reconfirm an international commitment to eliminate the sexual exploitation of children, according to the Foreign Ministry.
JAPAN
Sep 4, 2001

Poor economy taking toll on health care

The number of people losing their national health insurance certificate because they failed to pay premiums due to salary reductions and other hardships is on the rise.
COMMENTARY
Oct 23, 2000

LDP is up to its old tricks

The current 150th Diet session is in unprecedented chaos over an electoral reform bill to revise the Upper House voting system. The bill would change the roster system for candidates nominated in the proportional-representation segment of the Upper House polls. Currently, parties predetermine the ranks...
JAPAN
Jul 7, 2000

Defense chief does about-face on time limit for Marine base

Newly appointed Defense Agency chief Kazuo Torashima has had to retract a remark that it would be difficult to put a 15-year time limit on the use of a new airport for the U.S. Marines to be built in Nago, Okinawa Prefecture.
JAPAN
Jul 4, 2000

Mori and advisers make last-minute Cabinet decisions

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori continued consulting top Liberal Democratic Party officials Monday evening as he tried to finalize the lineup of his new Cabinet, to be launched today.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jun 29, 2000

Marriage guide for men begs the question, 'Et tu, Brutus?'

In the cultural wars secular liberalism continues its slow, laborious march toward victory (two steps forward, one step back), but one bastion of male-centered tradition remains inviolate: the marriage proposal. Men do the asking, and women wait for them to ask. The vector indicated by this dynamic mimics...
CULTURE / Books / POETRY MIGNETTE
Jun 18, 2000

Cafe's tempting literary brew

Cafe Independent, a "rattle-bag collection of poetry, art, pearls of prose . . . ," is produced by Oliver Kinghorn and Shannon Smith in Kyoto.
JAPAN
Dec 7, 1999

Chinese family exposes Japanese detention treatment

Staff writer The Immigration Bureau's Tokyo facility for holding foreigners who have overstayed their visas violates basic human rights, especially those of children, claims a Chinese family released last week after 40 days of detention there. Ling Xi Rang, 43, her second daughter, Xu Xiou Ri, 17, and...
JAPAN
Aug 13, 1999

Obuchi persuades Ozawa to stay in ruling camp

Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi ended a crisis in his ruling coalition on Friday, striking an accord with Liberal Party leader Ichiro Ozawa to resolve a dispute over the proposed cutting of Lower House seats that had pushed their eight-month-old alliance to the brink of collapse.
JAPAN
Aug 12, 1999

Liberals offer to extend seat cut debate

The ruling coalition and New Komeito, which intends to join it, continued last-minute negotiations Thursday to resolve their differences over a bill to cut 50 proportional representation seats in the Lower House.
JAPAN
Aug 6, 1999

Nonaka proposes removing war criminals from Yasukuni

Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiromu Nonaka on Friday proposed separately enshrining seven hanged class-A war criminals memorialized at Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine and stripping it of its religious status to enable the prime minister and Cabinet ministers to pay official visits there to honor Japan's war dead....
COMMUNITY
Jun 17, 1999

Trials and triumphs of black beauty

"Black is beautiful" was one of the most culturally charged American political slogans of the 1960s. Thirty years later, former model and educator Barbara Summers proves just how true those words are in her coffee-table book titled "Skin Deep: Inside the World of Black Fashion Models."
JAPAN
Apr 26, 1999

Lower House panel OKs guidelines bills

A Lower House special committee approved three controversial bills Monday to implement the updated Japan-U.S. defense guidelines, which will enable Japan to provide more military support to U.S. forces.
JAPAN
Feb 6, 1998

Cabinet savages Ota's turnabout on Nago heliport plan

Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto and members of his Cabinet expressed disappointment and anger Friday over Okinawa Gov. Masahide Ota's decision to officially reject the government's plan to construct a sea-based heliport off Nago.
JAPAN
Oct 17, 1997

Pitfalls seen in plan to reduce JNR debts

Finance Minister Hiroshi Mitsuzuka announced Oct. 17 his opposition to the idea of issuing special bonds with tax benefits to help dispose of the huge debts left behind by the Japanese National Railways.Mitsuzuka said a bond-issue would run counter to the principle of fairness in taxation. Taxes needed...

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami