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EDITORIALS
Feb 23, 2005

More challenges face EU charter

Spanish voters approved the European Union's new constitution by an overwhelming majority in Sunday's referendum -- the first time that a EU country had put the charter to a popular vote. This victory is no cause for complacency, however. The document, signed in October, will not take effect if it is...
COMMENTARY
Feb 21, 2005

Seoul's survival hangs on U.S. restraint

LOS ANGELES -- Hostage theory in international relations can explain why a lot of things do not happen. There's no better example than the North Korean crisis. The reason for continuing to talk to the North Koreans is not that we like them; it's that we care about the South Koreans.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 20, 2005

Gumshoes who pass in the night

THE RED EARTH OF ALABAMA, by Michiro Naito. Bloomington, Indiana: Authorhouse, 2005, 188 pp., $23.95 (cloth). KINKI LULLABY, by Issac Adamson. New York: Dark Alley, 2004, 358 pp., $13.95, (paper). Even in this age of political correctness, it's proving difficult for popular fiction to wean itself from...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Feb 20, 2005

"Hachiro: Haha no Uta, Chichi no Uta" on NHK and more

Hachiro Sato, who died in 1973, is one of Japan's most beloved writers of lyric poems and children's songs. His life, however, was far from gentle, as shown on the current nine-part NHK drama series, "Hachiro: Haha no Uta, Chichi no Uta (Hachiro: Songs for Mother, Songs for Father") (NHK-G, Mon., 9:15...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 20, 2005

Sugar frosted, the Thai way

VERY THAI: Everyday Popular Culture, by Philip Cornwel-Smith, photographs by John Goss, preface by Alex Kerr. Bangkok: River Books, 2005, 257 pp., color illustrated, 995 baht (cloth). All countries have something of their own, something the dictionary calls "a kind or sort, especially in regard to appearance...
BUSINESS
Feb 19, 2005

FSA to discipline Meiji Yasuda

The Financial Services Agency plans to order Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Co. later this month to suspend part of its business activities for about two weeks over alleged illegal sales practices, FSA sources said Friday.
BUSINESS
Feb 19, 2005

MMC asking around for buyer of U.S. operations

Struggling Japanese automaker Mitsubishi Motors Corp. is quietly seeking a buyer for its U.S. operations, implying the company intends to leave the world's biggest car market, the Asian Wall Street Journal reported Friday.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 19, 2005

Diaspora bridges China and ASEAN

SINGAPORE -- On Feb. 9, the start of the Year of the Rooster, ethnic Chinese communities across Southeast Asia took stock of their progress and their future in the shadow of China's peaceful development and its strengthened status within the region of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations....
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Feb 17, 2005

Natural numbers games

As island nations go, I have always maintained that Japan sits on a motherlode of biodiversity; it is rich in so many senses of the word.
EDITORIALS
Feb 15, 2005

Keeping to the PKO principles

With the signing of a peace agreement in Sudan, ravaged by more than 20 years of civil war, the government is weighing plans to have the Self-Defense Forces (SDF) participate in U.N. peacekeeping operations (PKO). Japan has received an informal request for cooperation from U.N. Secretary General Kofi...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Feb 15, 2005

Compromised NHK needs closer scrutiny

As someone who toiled for several years inside NHK during the early 1990s, it is bemusing to see the simplistic criticism of the quasi-official broadcaster by the Japanese media.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Feb 15, 2005

When is it OK to stretch the truth?

C.C. Sheffield Actress/Model, 22 It's okay to lie sometimes, when the result is going to be better than if you told the truth. For example, if your friend asks if she looks fat and she is fat. Tell her she's not.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 13, 2005

A laggard plan to end African poverty

LONDON — Last weekend the finance ministers of the Group of Seven industrialized countries met in London. British Finance Minister Gordon Brown tried to bounce his colleagues into setting up the largest aid program the world has ever seen: an International Finance Facility (IFF). He called it a new...
EDITORIALS
Feb 12, 2005

More disappointment for South Asia

South Asia is home to the some of the poorest nations in the world. The region desperately needs greater integration to marshal its resources and help stimulate development that will offer its citizens better lives. The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) was created to do just that,...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Feb 12, 2005

Taking play therapy to Sri Lanka tsunami orphans

Dr. Akiko Ohnogi is a vision in red. She is wearing red from top to toe -- from earrings to handbag and shoes -- because, put simply, "It's my favorite color."
COMMENTARY
Feb 11, 2005

Accept U.N. for what it isn't

LONDON -- At first glance, the slightly dated, 30-story United Nations building in New York's Lower East Side looks like misery mansion. Everything seems to be going wrong these days.
EDITORIALS
Feb 11, 2005

Middle East truce opens a door

How many times has the world observed an Israeli-Palestinian handshake and breathed a sigh of relief that hostilities in that sliver of the Middle East finally appeared to be ending? The answer, of course, is far too often for the latest declaration of peace to promise much. Camp David, the Rose Garden,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Feb 10, 2005

A treasure for the Game Boy

"Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories," a new role-playing adventure from Square- Enix for the Game Boy Advance, is an astounding achievement by Game Boy standards.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Feb 10, 2005

Learning how to make the most of middle age

It's widely acknowledged that the Japanese not only tend to look younger than people in the West, some think and behave that way too. After all, this is a nation fostered on kodomo bunka (kiddie culture), visible in everything from fashion to architecture.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 9, 2005

Chimeras and shadows

In the service of the imagination of photographer Yuki Onodera, familiar objects become dreamily unsettled by memories and movements and, by degrees, disengage to the point of of unreality.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 7, 2005

Forging an alternative to U.S. hegemony

BRUSSELS -- At a series of meetings around the left-leaning World Parliamentary Forum (WPF) held late last month in Porto Alegre, Brazil, there was a strong case made for the necessity of building a new economic and political partnership between the European Union and South America.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 7, 2005

Beijing's military buildup races ahead

HONOLULU -- China is modernizing its military forces faster than anyone expected only a few years ago, escalating the potential danger to the island of Taiwan, to American forces and bases in Asia, and to the overall balance of power in the region.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Feb 7, 2005

Amendment must be made easier to ensure prosperity for Japan

On Jan. 18, Keidanren released a report on basic national issues including constitutional revision and diplomatic and national security policies. It was the first time this business lobby had put together a set of proposals on these matters.
MORE SPORTS
Feb 6, 2005

Davenport to face Sharapova in final

Davenport to face Sharapova in final
EDITORIALS
Feb 6, 2005

Prohibition in Bhutan

The news out of the Himalayas last week was all about Nepal, where King Gyanendra on Tuesday dissolved the government and proclaimed a state of emergency. (The move was billed as an attempt to end an intractable Maoist insurgency; observers predict it will only feed the flames.) But if you think Nepal...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Feb 6, 2005

"Matthew's Best Hit TV" and "Shojiki Shindoi" gets joint special on TV Asahi and more

Next month will mark the 10th anniversary of the sarin gas attacks carried out by Aum Supreme Truth cult on a Tokyo subway during the morning rush hour. On Tuesday, NHK's documentary series "Project X" (NHK-G, 9:15 p.m.) will take a detailed look back at the medical-emergency measures implemented immediately...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 6, 2005

The Chemical Brothers: "Push the Button"

Having been dragged under the zeitgeist when the Big Beat craze fizzled out, the Chemical Brothers no longer have any claims to being the vanguard of a revolution; but that doesn't mean their popularity has waned. They quickly sold out next weekend's two Tokyo shows, thus necessitating an added blowout...

Longform

Once smoky, male-dominated spaces, today's net cafes, like Kaikatsu Club, are working to make their operations more attractive to women customers.
The second life of Japan's net cafes