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SOCCER / THE BALD TRUTH
Apr 17, 2001

Small minds behind the small screen

Have you been lucky enough to follow England's World Cup qualifiers or Liverpool's progress in the UEFA Cup on SKY PerfecTV recently? Let me rephrase that: Have you been clever enough?
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 12, 2001

Will Pyongyang split U.S., South Korea?

SEOUL -- The recent shakeup in Seoul's foreign policy and security team in the aftermath of the Washington summit represents a double effort to patch up relations with the United States, while persuading North Korea to come back to the bargaining table. Both tasks require supreme diplomatic skill.
CULTURE / Film
Apr 11, 2001

Comical Sturm und Drang , all in the family

Rendan Rating: * * * * Director: Naoto Takenaka Running time: 104 minutes Language: JapaneseNow playing "What does woman want?" Freud famously asked -- a question that is just as famously unanswerable. At the dawn of the modern feminist era, however, many women seemed to want what Anais Nin, in a 1974...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Mar 22, 2001

What's in store for the third Musketeer?

By now Ichiro Suzuki is making a name for himself in America. The only question is what that name is. When The Associated Press and some other news organizations report on the former Orix BlueWave star, they refer to a player named "Suzuki." But back here in Japan he's always been known as "Ichiro."...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 20, 2001

U.S.-ROK ties show new signs of strain

SEOUL -- It is difficult not to compare the Seoul summit between South Korean President Kim Dae Jung and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and its sequel in Washington between Kim and U.S. President George W. Bush, given both countries' long history and deep involvement in Korean affairs. The stark...
JAPAN
Mar 2, 2001

Murakami arrested over bribes

Prosecutors on Thursday arrested Masakuni Murakami, a powerful member of the LDP who quit the party last week in the midst of an ongoing scandal, for allegedly accepting bribes from mutual aid foundation KSD.
MULTIMEDIA / SPORTS SCOPE
Mar 1, 2001

IOC delegates: the questions they should be asking

The International Olympic Committee has come Japan to check out Osaka's facilities for staging the 2008 Olympics.
BUSINESS
Feb 19, 2001

Toward financial transparency

Fifth in a series
BUSINESS
Feb 19, 2001

Toward financial transparency

Fifth in a series
EDITORIALS
Feb 4, 2001

Ginger, the new IT girl

Among the many things for which whiz-bang American inventor Dean Kamen is famous is an automated wheelchair that can ride over uneven ground and climb stairs. That particular breakthrough device was code-named "Fred." Now, as everyone this side of the grave must have heard, there is also "Ginger." Some...
BUSINESS
Jan 15, 2001

Next U.S. president should use surplus to pace savings rate

Amid growing signs of a slowdown in the U.S. economy, the whole world is closely awaiting the new policies of President-elect George W. Bush, who prevailed in one of the closest presidential races in U.S. history after more than a month of unprecedented legal wrangling.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 9, 2001

Caution and patience are key to Japan-North Korea relations

There have been earthshaking developments on the Korean Peninsula in the past six months. North Korean leader Kim Jong Il began to play a central role in Pyongyang's international relations, a year after the country started making diplomatic overtures worldwide. North Korea relaxed tense relations with...
JAPAN
Dec 2, 2000

Bill foot-dragging belies pluralist goal

The postponement of debate on a bill that would grant limited suffrage to foreigners until next year at the earliest has prompted long-term foreign residents of Japan to question whether the nation is serious about embracing the foreign population.
JAPAN
Nov 26, 2000

Hase killer still at large, lawyer fears

KOBE -- The May 1997 murder of 11-year-old Jun Hase in Suma Ward here shocked Japan and made world headlines for the sensational nature of the crime.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 19, 2000

Education yesterday, today and tomorrow

My four children have attended Japanese schools from kindergarten up. Over the years there have been innumerable positive experiences connected with this. Yet one thing has always struck me as, at best, blatantly incongruous. Virtually every principal addressing pupils and parents at the commencement...
EDITORIALS
Nov 15, 2000

Ground the flying-tanker plans

With the government budget for fiscal 2001 now in preparation, a controversial question concerning defense procurement looms large: Do the Self-Defense Forces need in-flight refueling aircraft? The Defense Agency is requesting appropriations to purchase one such aircraft in the year beginning next April....
EDITORIALS
Nov 6, 2000

Neighbors, yet strangers

The latest round of normalization talks held in Beijing last week between Japan and North Korea failed to reach any specific agreement. Although no statement was issued, it seems clear that the two sides largely agreed to disagree, at least for the moment. The two nations remained divided over the pivotal...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Oct 30, 2000

U.S. reporter misses the mark on Japan

"Given America's willingness to avert its eyes from the most troubling chapters of its history and to resist critical self-evaluation and discussion of the country's atrocities against native Americans and African Americans . . ."
JAPAN
Oct 18, 2000

How dead is dead enough?

The line between life and death has grown increasingly obscure in the United States, the world's most active organ-transplant community, as surgeons grapple with a delicate problem: Organs available for transplant may become less viable if pronouncement of a donor's death is delayed until death is beyond...
COMMENTARY
Oct 13, 2000

Communists to 'tolerate' SDF

The national convention of the Japan Communist Party is expected to approve a proposal in November to revise its charter in order to tolerate the mobilization of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces in a military emergency. The policy turnaround to match the party's basic stance to reality was long overdue....
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 23, 2000

No German blueprint for the two Koreas

SEOUL -- The relationship between local autonomy and unification is becoming an increasingly hot topic in South Korea, as more and more local authorities aspire to an active role in the process of rapprochement with the North. It is clear that this nation is passing through a historic moment. Hardly...
EDITORIALS
Sep 14, 2000

What did Russia want?

The arrest last Friday of a Maritime Self-Defense Force officer on suspicion of spying for Russia raises the puzzling question: How is it that Moscow needed, or seemed to need, military secrets from Japan in the post-Cold War period, particularly at a time when relations between the two nations are improving?...
COMMENTARY
Aug 26, 2000

Is the Bank of Japan right?

LONDON -- The governor of the Bank of Japan, Masaru Hayami, and the majority of the BOJ's policy council have drawn criticism from the Japanese government and leaders of Japanese industry for the decision to end the BOJ's zero-interest-rate policy. These criticisms have been echoed in the British press....
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 31, 2000

Japan-Russia exchanges build vital trust

Last month I had an opportunity to visit Kunashiri and Etorofu Islands -- two of the four Russian-occupied islands claimed by Japan -- under a visa-free exchange program. It was my second trip to the Northern Territories, which consist of Kunashiri, Etorofu, Shikotan and Habomai Islands. On my first...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 20, 2000

A chance for Japan to define and refocus the globalization debate

The world is in an uneasy mood.
CULTURE / Books
Jul 18, 2000

The art and artistry of translation

WORDS, IDEAS, AND AMBIGUITIES: Four Perspectives on Translating from the Japanese, edited by Donald Richie. A Pacific Basin Institute Book, Imprint Publications, 2000, 88 pp., $19.95. This volume is a faithful account of an important and stimulating series of colloquia held at the International House...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 9, 2000

'Alien 5' now playing in your local neighborhood

A band of junior high-school students showed up at my door the other morning. "Can we interview you?" they asked.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 24, 2000

Korean summit remains a blank sheet

HONG KONG -- Perhaps it is in the nature of joint declarations that their merits tend to be exaggerated. The British did it with their joint declaration with China regarding Hong Kong, the Indians did it with their joint declaration with Pakistan at Lahore. Now the South Koreans, plus many foreigners...

Longform

Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell