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JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 19, 2004

9/11 conspiracy theories enthrall Japanese audiences

Only three years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, American mainstream media are providing scant coverage of ceremonies to mark the tragedy, according to Japanese reporter Akihiko Reizei on the Internet news service Japan Mail Media. A resident of New Jersey, Reizei said that unlike the...
JAPAN
Aug 15, 2004

Tokyo clinic kept fetuses from abortions in freezer

A maternity clinic in Tokyo has stored aborted fetuses in its freezer, according to Tokyo Metropolitan Government officials who have inspected the clinic.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 8, 2004

Japan hopes to bear it out to gain a World Heritage Site

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization convened the 28th World Heritage Committee in Suzhou, China in early July to screen candidates for World Heritage sites, which are cultural or natural treasures meant to be preserved intact forever. The big news out of the session was...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Mar 11, 2004

Bush majors in suppression of science

It comes as no surprise that U.S. President George W. Bush is calling for a constitutional amendment limiting marriage to heterosexual couples. He is simply using the age-old tactic of picking on others to save his own hide.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 1, 2004

Japan needs to emerge from behind America's apron: Wolferen

Japan may be the world's No. 2 economic power, but where diplomacy is concerned, Karel G. van Wolferen likens it to a boy who has to ask his parents (i.e. the United States) if he can go outside to play.
JAPAN
Oct 25, 2003

Ishihara tells Fujii to hold his tongue

Transport minister Nobuteru Ishihara said Friday he would not comply with a request by Haruho Fujii for exemption from the public servant's oath to keep official secrets.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2003

Liberal ideals gain ground in the Asia-Pacific region

MANILA -- In past decades, liberal democracy and economic freedom have made great advances in all parts of the world. This general trend also applies to Asia, as is documented in the annual "Freedom in the World" surveys published by the Washington-based Heritage Foundation and the "Economic Freedom...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jul 3, 2003

What a week that was

It was a week filled with surprises and excitement.
COMMENTARY / World
May 9, 2003

The silent birth of a killer virus

BEIJING -- Is it the "big one" -- the indestructible one? Perhaps not. Either way, China's inability to tell the truth has made it a threat to all of us.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Apr 29, 2003

Overstaying visas, noisy neighbors and DIY trading

Visa overstaying I'm a Ukranian Citizen now in Japan. I have overstayed my tourist three-month visa. If I would like to go back to my country, what should I do? Can I buy an air ticket without a visa? Do they have money or other kinds of penalties for this type of case? -- Tokyo Don
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 29, 2003

Refugees treated like criminals

Last month, these pages carried the story of a Kurdish family that came to Japan seeking asylum, only to be torn apart by the country's arcane immigration laws.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Apr 28, 2003

America is the greatest abuser of WMD

NEW YORK -- One duplicitous aspect of the United States' war on Iraq has been the use of the term "weapons of mass destruction" (WMD). No, I am not talking about the kinds of weapons that are assumed in the question raised by the conservative Chicago Sun-Times columnist Robert Novak on April 7 -- "Where...
COMMENTARY
Apr 3, 2003

Economic effects of war concern China

HONG KONG -- The war in Iraq has brought to the surface strains in the Chinese-American relationship that had been papered over because of the two countries' common stand in the war on terrorism.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 2, 2002

China has robbed Keio University, Japan's Foreign Ministry of their independence

NEW YORK -- Japan has been in an uproar since five of its citizens who were abducted by North Korean agents more than 20 years ago were allowed to return home Oct. 15. But an even more ominous event for the country, though not prominently reported by the mass media, occurred last month: the "kidnapping"...
SOCCER / THE BALD TRUTH
Apr 16, 2002

Careful with that tree, Eugene!

After months of teetering on the brink of full-blown silliness, World Cup organizers finally appear to have plunged into a vortex occupied by Teletubbies, giant talking tadpoles and Benny Hill lookalikes.
JAPAN
Aug 3, 2001

Yasukuni furor sparks legal threat

Citizens' groups said Thursday they may sue Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi for violating the Constitution if he visits Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine on the Aug. 15 anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender.
COMMENTARY / World
May 2, 2001

South Korea weighs a constitutional revision

SEOUL -- In private, even his friends acknowledge that South Korean President Kim Dae Jung has passed the peak of his term. With the opposition increasingly less inclined to cooperate, it has become ever more difficult for the "government of the people" to enact domestic reforms.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 15, 2001

No wonder Seoul's politicos get no respect

SEOUL -- Some days ago I received a telephone call from the Office of the Chief Spokesman of the National Assembly. A friendly public-relations officer invited me to write an article for the National Assembly Review with personal observations regarding the challenges for parliamentary politics in South...
JAPAN
Jun 17, 2000

Milan bombing suspect files libel suit in Japan

A 52-year-old man wanted by Italian authorities for his alleged involvement in the deadly 1969 bombing of a Milan bank filed a defamation suit Friday with the Tokyo District Court against two newspapers and two magazine publishers.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 20, 2000

Kaigo hoken throws spotlight on life in 'nursing care hell'

A few weeks ago I submitted a proposal for an April Fool's story to a local publication. The piece would have been a news report about Japanese airline companies taking advantage of "Japan's rapidly aging society" by offering "nursing care miles" to frequent flyers in order to attract middle-aged travelers....
Japan Times
WORLD
Jun 22, 2023

Why is Narendra Modi so popular? Tune in to find out.

Modi playing on-air host to the world’s most populous nation is one way he has made himself intimately omnipresent across India’s vastness.
ASIA PACIFIC
Jun 6, 2023

In rare victory for media, Hong Kong court overturns conviction of journalist

A court ruled that “substantial and grave injustice” was done to Choy Yuk-ling, an investigative journalist who also goes by the name Bao Choy.
Japan Times
WORLD
May 8, 2023

How two men’s disparate paths crossed in a killing on New York's F train

Jordan Neely’s mental health decline played out in public after his mother was strangled. Daniel Penny said he was protecting himself and others when he choked Neely.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 25, 2023

Thailand’s most polarizing family rises again before election

An ousted populist’s daughter seeks office, fueling concerns that the return of a divisive political dynasty may revive instability, too.
Japan Times
WORLD
Apr 22, 2023

Pentagon speeds up tank timeline for Ukraine but resists calls for jets

The U.S. will begin training Ukrainian troops on M1 Abrams tanks in the next few weeks, officials said, and combat-ready tanks could reach the battlefields by the fall.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 23, 2023

Japanese Communist Party expulsions cause jitters in party ranks

Citing a serious violation of party regulations, the JCP expelled Nobuyuki Matsutake and Hajime Suzuki after both used book publications to agitate for the vote among party members.
PODCAST / deep dive
Mar 8, 2023

Moving to Fukushima? You’ll have to kick out the boars first

This week Alex K.T. Martin joins us to talk about the state of Fukushima 12 years after the quake. Animals have practically taken over, but Fukushima isn't the only place facing that challenge.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Feb 21, 2023

In Biden’s unannounced visit to Kyiv, a preview of an increasingly direct contest with Putin

The vastly different world views of U.S. President Biden and President Vladimir Putin of Russia will become vividly apparent in a rare split-screen moment on Tuesday.
Japan Times
PODCAST / deep dive
Feb 15, 2023

Living with disaster: Building the cities of the future

We speak to professor Hitoshi Abe, an architect who has some ideas on how to start designing our cities to better deal with such inevitable disasters.

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years