Search - 2002

 
 
BUSINESS
Dec 27, 2003

Household spending up in November

Spending by Japan's wage-earning households grew in November from the year-before level for the first time in three months, with income increasing for the first time since March 2002, the government said Friday.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 27, 2003

Shedding light on Kissinger's dark legacy

NEW YORK -- Recently released documents from the U.S. National Security Archive shed important light on former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's role in Argentina. These documents indicate that Kissinger approved of the Argentinian military junta's ruthless tactics to eliminate any opposition to its...
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2003

Court reverses order to halt expropriation of Tokyo land

The Tokyo High Court on Thursday repealed a lower court order that the national and local governments suspend expropriation of land in Akiruno, Tokyo, for a highway project.
EDITORIALS
Dec 26, 2003

Privatizing the highway corporations

Finally the stage has been set for the privatization of the debt-ridden highway corporations. The government plans to send related bills to the next Diet session, which opens in January. If the package is approved as scheduled, a new tollway system will go into operation in fiscal 2005 under the management...
BUSINESS
Dec 26, 2003

Fujitsu set to forge chip alliance with Sumitomo Electric

Fujitsu Ltd. and Sumitomo Electric Industries Ltd. will merge their compound semiconductor operations this spring in response to growing demand for chips used in digital products and communications devices, Fujitsu officials said Thursday.
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2003

Pyongyang offers to free abductees' kin -- but there's a catch

North Korean officials told Japanese lawmakers that Pyongyang is ready to send the family members of the five former Japanese abductees to Japan if they go to the Pyongyang airport to meet them, Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Katsuei Hirasawa said Thursday.
SOCCER / World cup
Dec 25, 2003

Japan to face Oman

Japan will face Oman in the first Asian qualifying round for the 2006 World Cup in February next year, the Japan Football Association said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Dec 25, 2003

Japan's eateries, stores in shock

Reports of the first case of mad cow disease in the United States dealt a blow Wednesday to Japan's food industry, which is still recovering from the fallout over the September 2001 domestic breakout of the fatal brain-wasting disease.
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Dec 24, 2003

Rugby needs to shift its goalposts one way or another

It seems that after every World Cup, the losers all band together and call for rule changes. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," is a concept alien in rugby circles.
JAPAN
Dec 24, 2003

Teachers stray in record numbers

The number of public school teachers who were punished for obscene conduct reached a record-high 175 nationwide in fiscal 2002, which ended March 31, according to the education ministry.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Dec 24, 2003

Kazuo Matsui dropped the Big Egg for the Big Apple

Kazuo "Little" Matsui is set to be the next Japanese star to make a huge splash in the major leagues and become the latest toast of the town in New York.
COMMENTARY
Dec 24, 2003

Ball now in China's court on Taiwan independence

HONG KONG -- With the Taiwan presidential election less than three months away, the behavior of the incumbent, President Chen Shui-bian, and that of the opposition Kuomintang candidate, Lien Chan, shows just how much things have changed in the last decade.
BUSINESS
Dec 23, 2003

S&P's upgrades exceed downgrades

Upgrades of corporate credit ratings here by Standard & Poor's in 2003 have exceeded downgrades for the first time in 13 years, the U.S. ratings agency said Monday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 23, 2003

Expressway plans get green light

The government and ruling coalition on Monday endorsed a privatization scheme for semigovernmental expressway operators that effectively fails to put the brakes on the completion of unfinished sections of the planned 9,342-km thruway network.
JAPAN
Dec 23, 2003

Ministry vows immediate steps to improve correctional system

The Justice Ministry announced Monday it will act immediately to improve the correctional system and prison conditions, including taking steps to reduce inmates' mandatory work hours, allow outsiders to visit prisons and revamp all padded cells.
JAPAN
Dec 21, 2003

Honshu-Shikoku Bridge to merge with road firm

The government and ruling parties formulated a final proposal Saturday for the privatization of four road corporations, agreeing to merge the Honshu-Shikoku Bridge Authority with another road company after fiscal 2005, by which time the authority's business should be back on track, government sources...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 21, 2003

Moved by the spirit of song

It was shaping up to be a Japanese Christmas like any other.
COMMENTARY
Dec 21, 2003

Devil of amity lurks in free trade details

SINGAPORE -- The decision at the Japan-ASEAN summit on Dec. 11-12 to create a new "special relationship" between the two may be historic, but the economic free-trade areas that will provide its foundation look like long shots. Japanese efforts are likely to be frustrated by the same political forces...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 20, 2003

Six arrested over shooting attacks on Aum, union offices

Tokyo police arrested six people Friday in connection with three shooting incidents targeting offices of Aum Shinrikyo in Tokyo and Osaka, as well as a shooting at a teachers' union office in Hiroshima, for which a rightist group claimed responsibility.
JAPAN
Dec 20, 2003

Overall crime down -- but murder on rise

The number of crimes in Japan is expected to drop in 2003 for the first time in eight years, according to a report on January-November crime figures released by the National Police Agency.
JAPAN
Dec 19, 2003

Average surface temperature falls to five-year low

Bucking the recent warming trend, the average surface temperature in Japan this year was the lowest since 1997, according to the Meteorological Agency.
BUSINESS
Dec 19, 2003

Sky Perfect to acquire Plat One

Sky Perfect Communications Inc., operator of the Sky PerfecTV digital satellite broadcasting service, said Thursday it will acquire smaller rival Plat One Corp. through a share swap on March 1.

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