Search - 2000

 
 
JAPAN
Feb 14, 2001

Mori, Putin plan March treaty talks

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet in the Russian city of Irkutsk on March 25 for peace treaty talks, the two leaders agreed during a phone conversation Tuesday.
LIFE / Travel
Feb 14, 2001

The Chinese are coming!

BEIJING -- For centuries, Chinese living away from home loyally trekked back to their ancestral villages every Spring Festival. Last month, a record 45 million people hit road, rail and airlines during the seven-day public holiday. The most auspicious date in the lunar calendar is a time for family reunions....
JAPAN
Feb 12, 2001

LDP should return 'fees' from KSD affiliate: Kanzaki

The Liberal Democratic Party should return the money provided to it under the guise of party membership fees by an affiliate of the scandal-tainted industrial mutual aid organization KSD, the leader of the LDP's key coalition partner said Sunday.
CULTURE / Books
Feb 12, 2001

Forget Big Brother -- it's little brothers that count

ORDER BY ACCIDENT: The origins and consequences of conformity in contemporary Japan, by Alan S. Miller and Satoshi Kanazawa. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 2000, 156 pp., $25/17.99 pounds(cloth). The title of this book is misleading, although it captures the main idea of the authors, two social...
JAPAN
Feb 11, 2001

Itabashi fix-it men shed light on wasteful society

In the basement of Itabashi Ward's Ecopolis Center, knives, pots, umbrellas and other knickknacks find a lease on life.
JAPAN
Feb 10, 2001

Tokyo plan will allow placement in university

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government plans to allow the enrollment in universities and colleges of applicants without high school diplomas, counter to central government policy, in as early as two years, metro officials said Friday.
COMMENTARY
Feb 10, 2001

Upheaval on the horizon

Diet debate started Tuesday on the fiscal 2001 government budget. The debate is likely to see head-on confrontation between the ruling and opposition forces. The government and the ruling coalition are hoping to pass the budget before fiscal 2000 ends March 31 in order to prepare for an Upper House election...
JAPAN
Feb 10, 2001

BOJ cuts discount rate to record low of 0.35%

Coming under intense political pressure, the Bank of Japan decided Friday to reduce the official discount rate by 0.15 percentage points to a record low 0.35 percent.
JAPAN
Feb 10, 2001

Public works bid-rigging said widespread

Takehiko Mori says he is confessing to his crime now that the three-year statute of limitations for the offense has expired.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2001

Coalition will complete plan to boost stocks today: Kamei

The ruling coalition will accelerate work on measures to revive share prices, compiling them by tonight, the top policy maker of the Liberal Democratic Party said Thursday.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2001

Tepco to put new plants on hold

Tokyo Electric Power Co. will postpone the introduction of new power facilities by three to five years in the face of slow growth in domestic power demand, the company said Thursday.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2001

Tepco to put new plants on hold

Tokyo Electric Power Co. will postpone the introduction of new power facilities by three to five years in the face of slow growth in domestic power demand, the company said Thursday.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2001

Towel firms seek curb on cheap imports

Domestic towel-makers will ask the government in the near future to impose an emergency curb on towel imports from China, officials of the Japan Towel Industrial Association said Wednesday.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2001

Auto unions begin spring wage talks

Labor organizations representing employees of major automakers on Wednesday presented their annual list of wage and benefits demands to management as another difficult year looms for Japan's blue-collar workers.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2001

Auto unions begin spring wage talks

Labor organizations representing employees of major automakers on Wednesday presented their annual list of wage and benefits demands to management as another difficult year looms for Japan's blue-collar workers.
JAPAN
Feb 8, 2001

Poor crop casts shadow on Nori Day

Tuesday marked Nori Day in Japan, an annual event when farmers of "nori," or seaweed, stage various activities aimed at expanding its consumption.
JAPAN
Feb 8, 2001

Poor crop casts shadow on Nori Day

Tuesday marked Nori Day in Japan, an annual event when farmers of "nori," or seaweed, stage various activities aimed at expanding its consumption.
JAPAN
Feb 8, 2001

KSD ally held concerts to aid LDP's Murakami

An official at an affiliate of the scandal-tainted mutual aid foundation KSD staged "enka" concerts in 1995 and 1996 on behalf of Masakuni Murakami of the Liberal Democratic Party, sources said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Feb 8, 2001

KSD ally held concerts to aid LDP's Murakami

An official at an affiliate of the scandal-tainted mutual aid foundation KSD staged "enka" concerts in 1995 and 1996 on behalf of Masakuni Murakami of the Liberal Democratic Party, sources said Wednesday.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2001

Overseas sales lift JT to net profit

Japan Tobacco Inc. said Wednesday that it posted a net profit of $10 million in overseas cigarette sales in 2000, a turnaround from a net loss of $16 million the previous year.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2001

Overseas sales lift JT to net profit

Japan Tobacco Inc. said Wednesday that it posted a net profit of $10 million in overseas cigarette sales in 2000, a turnaround from a net loss of $16 million the previous year.
BUSINESS
Feb 7, 2001

Price falls have Miyazawa, BOJ at odds

The Group of Seven finance ministers and central bank governors are likely to join the debate over Japanese prices later this month in Italy — a debate in which the government and BOJ continue to see falling prices in a different light.
BUSINESS
Feb 7, 2001

Neither yen nor dollar face uphill factors

Given the recent slew of data showing a sharp slowdown in the U.S. economy, a strong dollar rebound appears unlikely in the near term.
JAPAN
Feb 6, 2001

Murakami will testify under oath about KSD

Masakuni Murakami, former head of the Liberal Democratic Party's House of Councilors members, agreed Monday to testify under oath over his ties to KSD, a mutual-aid foundation at the heart of a widening bribery scandal.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 6, 2001

Trauma in a sepia-tinged Kyushu

It's not easy filming the inner lives of human beings. Novelists can go on at length about their protagonist's stream of consciousness (see "Ulysses") while filmmakers cannot show scene after voiced-over scene of that same stream without inducing audience catatonia. See Joseph Strick's misbegotten 1967...
BUSINESS
Feb 6, 2001

Tokyo bourse may have reached bottom

After peaking out last April, Tokyo stocks have fallen past one major threshold after another and are now languishing at the lowest level since late 1998.
BUSINESS
Feb 6, 2001

Tokyo bourse may have reached bottom

After peaking out last April, Tokyo stocks have fallen past one major threshold after another and are now languishing at the lowest level since late 1998.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 6, 2001

Modernism revealed

FICTIONS OF DESIRE: Narrative Form in the Novels of Nagai Kafu, by Stephen Snyder. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2000, 196 pp., $42 (cloth), $17.95 (paper). Recently, it has been argued that the 18th-century realist tradition (Balzac, Dickens and on to now) is not the only such tradition;...

Longform

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.
What comes after 100?