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COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Mar 29, 2005

Seeking advice on accidents and health

Accidents Not so long ago, Jay had an accident. While riding her bicycle, she hit a woman who had to go to the hospital, where she was given a full check-up by the doctor and emerged with a clean bill of health.
BASEBALL / MLB
Mar 26, 2005

Hillman's Fighters poised to win it all

In just two seasons American manager Trey Hillman has taken the perennial second-division finishing Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters to the Pacific League playoffs.
COMMENTARY
Mar 24, 2005

Northern Territories dispute highlights flawed diplomacy

Japan is now in serious territorial disputes with all of its neighbors -- Taiwan, China, South Korea and Russia. True, this could prove there is something wrong with all of Japan's neighbors. But it could also prove that there is something wrong in the way Japan handles territorial problems with its...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 22, 2005

Fresh foreign angles

Japan has been a magnet for foreign writers and journalists since opening to the West.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

Native soul drifts back home

HUDSON: A Collection of Tanka, by Kisaburo Konoshima, translated by David Callner, text in English and Japanese. Tokyo: The Japan Times, 2004, 135 pp., 2,500 yen (paper). It was 34 years ago, in 1970, that the Meiji Era-born Japanese-American Kisaburo Konoshima (1893-1984) published "Hudson" (Tokyo,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

The undeniable legacy left after Japan wreaked havoc

RACE WAR! White Supremacy and the Japanese Attack on the British Empire, by Gerald Horne. New York and London: New York University Press, 2004, 407 pp., 4,478 yen (cloth). Racism is a particularly dirty issue of World War II in Asia that is often swept under the carpet. Tokyo's claim that Japan stood...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 17, 2005

Pyongyang under EU's wing

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- The European Union is increasingly showing a new independent stance on foreign-policy issues as the logic of its industrial and economic integration plays out in the international arena.
EDITORIALS
Mar 16, 2005

A vacuum in Chechnya

Russia is claiming a major victory in the war against Chechen rebels with the killing of Mr. Aslan Maskhadov, leader of the Chechen separatist movement. Mr. Maskhadov has long been Moscow's nemesis, but he is also thought to have been a genuine moderate among the Chechen militants. His death may intensify...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Mar 13, 2005

Fuji TV in a Horie to distance itself from IT man

Next month, Fuji TV will launch another batch of up-to-the-minute trendy drama series. Among them is one called "Koi ni Ochitara/Boku no Seiko no Himitsu (Falling in Love/The Secret of My Success)" starring SMAP member Tsuyoshi Kusanagi as a young man who, after his small family-run factory goes bankrupt,...
EDITORIALS
Mar 8, 2005

Military threat is counterproductive

The agenda for the current National People's Congress of China reportedly includes an antisecession bill for preventing the independence of Taiwan. The Chinese leadership wants to have the bill enacted by the end of the session on March 14. The contents of the draft legislation have not been made public,...
COMMENTARY
Mar 6, 2005

Trashing liberties we die for

LONDON -- At the end of last year, 69 men, it is thought, were being held in British prisons as terrorist suspects. Only 11 of these had been convicted of any offense. Twelve were being held in Belmarsh prison without trial (since then, one has been moved to Broadmoor, a high security mental hospital)....
SOCCER / J. League
Mar 5, 2005

J. League gets with the world program

Who says the Japanese are inflexible?
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 3, 2005

Australia's rising Iraqi stake

SYDNEY -- Is Australia's decision to send troops to guard Japanese reconstruction workers in Iraq reasonable? Not if you believe Australians who are still fighting World War II or are angry at our armed presence in Iraq.
EDITORIALS
Mar 2, 2005

Putting a lid on proliferation

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is to discuss plans for the international management of the gateways to nuclear-weapons development -- activities related to uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing. The debate follows a report submitted by a committee of experts to the board of governors,...
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Feb 27, 2005

Isiah's plan to improve Knicks puzzling

NEW YORK -- On a day it might have been easier for the NBA to relocate franchises rather than move the multitude of traded players, Isiah Thomas almost did exactly the opposite of what he's been saying over the last couple weeks he wouldn't do.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 26, 2005

Disaster poses Yudhoyono's biggest test

SINGAPORE -- Two months after a tsunami ravaged Aceh and parts of North Sumatra province, a joke making the rounds in Jakarta says the initials of In- donesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Vice President Jusuf Kalla, or SBY-JK, stand for Sudah banyak yang jadi korban ("Never have there been...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Feb 24, 2005

A game darn near too scary

If you are looking for the biggest jolt video gaming has to offer, and you don't mind having nightmares, take a deep breath and try "Biohazard 4."
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Feb 24, 2005

'Win-win' tie-up sets sights on sustainable seafood stocks

At the New England Aquarium in Boston, Mass., Heather Tausig is leading a project that, until recently, was unimaginable.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 21, 2005

The right thing is not permanent tax cuts

WASHINGTON -- Since his re-election, President George W. Bush has emphasized the need for U.S. fiscal responsibility. He has pledged to halve the enormous federal budget deficit in his second term. He has vowed to put social security on a sound, long-term footing. And he has just submitted a 2006 budget...
EDITORIALS
Feb 13, 2005

Dead man moonwalking

Pity Michael Jackson. Of course, that's after checking off a long list of other justifiable reactions to the sad, clown-like figure whose trial on child molestation and other charges is now getting under way in California with all the solemnity of a circus. Amazement, impatience, sympathy, repugnance,...
MORE SPORTS
Feb 11, 2005

Kitajima says that despite the fame, he is still the same

It has been nearly six months now since he shot to stardom at the Athens Olympics, but swimmer Kosuke Kitajima says that, in spite of all that has transpired since, fame has not altered his personality, though it has changed his life.
COMMENTARY
Feb 8, 2005

LDP missing the big picture

How to privatize postal services is the biggest issue in the regular Diet session. The government plans to introduce a privatization package in mid-March, and Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has vowed to "get it through the current session at all costs." But with many members of the Liberal Democratic...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 6, 2005

The attractive helplessness of a reluctant foreigner

THE TOWER OF LONDON: Tales of Victorian London, by Natsume Soseki, translated and introduced by Damian Flanagan, calligraphy by Kosaka Misuzu. London: Peter Owen, 2005, 240 pp., 12 illustrations, £14.95 (paper). In 1900 the Japanese government sent three young scholars to London to study and equip themselves...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 31, 2005

Key to a common currency

The Economist magazine forecast in a recent issue that a future multiple reserve currency system could include the Chinese yuan: "The world might drift toward a multiple reserve currency system shared by the dollar, the euro and the yen, or indeed the yuan at some time in the future."
COMMENTARY
Jan 26, 2005

Things look up to Downer

LOS ANGELES -- They say an optimist looks at the very same glass that the pessimist sees as half-empty and proclaims it to be half-full. By that measure, one of the world's foremost optimists has got to be Alexander Downer, Australia's minister for foreign affairs.
JAPAN
Jan 24, 2005

Tougher restrictions on foreign entertainers to be enforced in March

The planned restrictions on foreign entertainers, mostly affecting women from the Philippines, will be put in place during the first half of March, government officials said Sunday.
EDITORIALS
Jan 24, 2005

Tracking sex-crime offenders

The Justice Ministry, concerned about the growing incidence of sex offenses against children, is set to launch a tracking system for convicted sex criminals, perhaps by the end of March. The idea is to try to reduce the possibility of their repeating similar offenses by having them keep the National...
COMMENTARY
Jan 23, 2005

The lobbyists who advertise

MANILA -- As the complexity of the issues facing our societies continues to grow, political decision-makers increasingly face the problem of how to handle what is often termed information overkill.

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji