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COMMENTARY / World
Nov 22, 2001

Protecting the public from the threats of terror and depression

In his Sept. 30 New York Times article, "The Fear Economy," MIT economist Paul Krugman warned that the American public should be prepared for a possible deflationary spiral comparable to the Great Depression of the 1930s and Japan's milder but chronic depression of the 1990s. A major depression could...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Nov 22, 2001

Dark clouds looming in the Sky

I wish Southampton would buy a Japanese player. Sky-Perfect TV would get all excited, send over an army of media and TV crews and, "presto," I would be watching Southampton games every weekend. Christmas would have come early for a frustrated Saints fan who hardly ever gets to see his team play, apart...
BUSINESS
Nov 22, 2001

Japan may wane as China's star rises: regional expert

Japan should be aware of the quickly changing economic environment in Asia, where China is fast emerging as an economic power and Southeast Asian countries are starting to doubt Japan's ability for regional economic leadership, the visiting chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs...
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Nov 22, 2001

Alien killers revel in 'cute pet' role

As a family, cats have successfully colonized the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia, with only Australia among the larger landmasses lacking native species. They range in size from the immense Siberian tiger to the diminutive black-footed cat of southern Africa, and take an equally diverse range of prey....
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Nov 22, 2001

Wise words from Earth's defenders

Most of us have heard warnings that humans are destroying the Earth and all that lives on it since we were toddlers. So much so that the message has lost its urgency. More than that, we've become cynical. What good can we do when in the United States, for example, every bill aimed at cutting back on...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 22, 2001

Oil fears make attack on Iraq unlikely

LONDON -- "We hear that Iraq may be targeted," said Sheik Ahmed Zaki al-Yamani, oil minister of Saudi Arabia during the 1970s and '80s heyday of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and now chairman of the London-based Center for Global Energy Studies. "Now, if that is a fact, the attacks...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Nov 22, 2001

Singing the praises of glorious mud flats

How's this for a writer with a bee in his shorts?: "Upon ratifying the Ramsar Convention, Japan agreed to 'promote the conservation of wetlands and waterfowl by establishing nature reserves in wetlands . . . and providing adequately for their wardening' [Article 4]. So far, Japan has made no effort to...
BUSINESS
Nov 22, 2001

Bill passes to relax stock option rules

The Diet passed a bill Wednesday to revise the Commercial Code to ease restrictions on the granting and exercising of stock options in a bid to stimulate business activity.
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Nov 22, 2001

When cartoons go wacky

The brains at Microsoft could have fixed it so that you had to purchase an Xbox game console to play "Cel Damage," but they didn't.
BUSINESS
Nov 21, 2001

Second extra budget 'being considered': Koizumi

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Tuesday he is considering compiling a second supplementary budget for this fiscal year, indicating the government has started discussions on its size and contents.
EDITORIALS
Nov 21, 2001

An ambiguous SDF dispatch plan

The Cabinet's approval last Friday of a basic Self-Defense Forces deployment plan, designed to provide noncombat support for U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, opened the way for the first "wartime" mobilization of SDF troops overseas. The government emphasizes that the plan is within the framework...
CULTURE / Film
Nov 21, 2001

Whatever Luhrmann wants, I don't get

Moulin Rouge Rating: * * Director: Baz Luhrmann Running time: 128 minutes Language: English Now showing
CULTURE / Film
Nov 21, 2001

Firmly on the map

The Sixth Pusan International Film Festival proved to the rest of the film world that it means business, both figuratively and literally. Attendance was down by about 40,000 from last year, but PIFF still managed to fill 143,103 seats over nine days (Nov. 9-17), during which 201 films from 60 countries...
JAPAN
Nov 21, 2001

Ministry to keep ban on untested beef

Farm minister Tsutomu Takebe pledged Tuesday to maintain a ban on the distribution of 13,000 tons of beef from cows butchered before nationwide cattle testing began for mad cow disease on Oct. 18.
CULTURE / Film
Nov 21, 2001

Oh Father, forgive us our cinematic trespasses

Bless the Child Rating: * * 1/2 Director: Chuck Russell Running time: 107 minutes Language: English Opens Dec. 1 at the Shibuya Tokyu 3 Theater
BUSINESS
Nov 21, 2001

Securitize home loans: panel

A framework for the securitization of housing loans should be created before Government Housing Loan Corp. is privatized, the head of an advisory panel to the land minister proposed Tuesday.
CULTURE / Film
Nov 21, 2001

All under the sun

The Japanese, my barber once told me, "don't really think of Hawaii as America -- for us, it's more like part of Japan." But after Sept. 11, many Japanese who might have otherwise booked a wedding in Honolulu or a golf holiday in Maui suddenly realized that Hawaii really was part of the United States...
CULTURE / Film
Nov 21, 2001

When marketing hits the target, that's amore

Reisei to Jonetsu no Aida Rating: * * Director: Isamu Nakae Running time: 124 minutes Language: Japanese Now showing
COMMENTARY
Nov 21, 2001

Recipe for economic change

WASHINGTON — In recent weeks, Taiwan has taken two steps to prepare for the transformation of its economy. Taipei's decision to lift many of the restrictions on investment in the mainland and the island's entry into the World Trade Organization will produce fundamental shifts in the way Taiwan conducts...
COMMENTARY
Nov 21, 2001

LDP strife must end before it's too late

The entire world has undergone radical change since terrorists attacked New York and Washington on Sept. 11. Having identified Osama bin Laden as the mastermind of the attacks, the United States, with military cooperation from Britain, launched bombing raids against Afghanistan's Taliban regime in October....
JAPAN
Nov 21, 2001

War orphan from China finds Nagano man is her brother

One of 19 war-displaced Japanese from China searching for relatives in Japan was confirmed Tuesday to be the sister of a Nagano Prefecture man after meeting him in Tokyo.
BUSINESS
Nov 21, 2001

Asahi Bank forecasts net loss of 520 billion yen

Asahi Bank on Tuesday said it projects a 520 billion yen unconsolidated net loss for this business year as it sets aside a hefty 400 billion yen in loan loss reserves to rein in its ballooning bad-loan problem.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 21, 2001

Nation struggles with drug abuse

A suspended prison term handed down six years ago was not enough to stop the 34-year-old gas station worker from using amphetamines, which had already badly damaged his life.
JAPAN
Nov 21, 2001

Theft of bank data system leads to Aum arrest

Tokyo police Tuesday arrested a member of Aum Shinrikyo on suspicion of stealing a transaction data management system from a major Japanese bank.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Nov 21, 2001

2002 could be busy year in Japanese sports

You read last week where the National Football League is coming back to Japan next year, having scheduled an American Bowl exhibition game between the San Francisco 49ers and Washington Redskins in Osaka on Aug. 3. Let's hope this will be the first of several announcements of major international sports...

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’