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COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Feb 20, 2000

Roberto E. Wirth

Above the Spanish Steps, commanding an incomparable panorama of eternal Rome, stands the opulent Hotel Hassler. The Wirth family, coproprietors of the Hassler since 1916, became sole proprietors in 1964, when the hotel approached 80 years of age and fame. Roberto E. Wirth, today's president and general...
JAPAN
Feb 17, 2000

Japan experts' departure leaves U.S. in lurch

WASHINGTON -- Two Japan experts in the U.S. administration will leave their office, raising concern about the impact on efforts to resolve a host of bilateral issues. Kurt Campbell will quit as deputy assistant secretary of defense and join the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a U.S....
JAPAN
Feb 8, 2000

Business minds look for bright spots at Kansai seminar

Staff writer KYOTO -- The fear of losing out to the U.S. in economic globalization will be among the topics raised at the 38th annual Kansai Economic Seminar, which opens today in Kyoto. Sponsored by the Kansai Association of Corporate Executives, the seminar brings together the region's top business...
JAPAN
Feb 7, 2000

Analysis: Ota's first priority is to refill city coffers

Staff writer OSAKA -- Fusae Ota's election win here Sunday night is good news for local residents and the nation as a whole, in the sense that Osaka has elected the nation's first female governor. It is also good news for Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, because since a win for Ota, a former bureaucrat...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 2, 2000

High-tech juggernaut is a dangerous ride

Apparently, sales of dog food by the U.S. shopping giant Wal-Mart were bigger than the worldwide sales chalked up by e-commerce last year. Even if that is true, the current media frenzy about e-commerce makes it hard to countenance. There is a danger that this current fashion for one particular technology...
EDITORIALS
Feb 1, 2000

Glimmers of hope in Sri Lanka

There are few more enduring and pointless tragedies than the civil war that has raged across the island nation of Sri Lanka. That island paradise has suffered through nearly two decades of terrorism while the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam fought for their independence. Yet even as the death toll continues...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 31, 2000

Voting on Taiwan's future

Taiwan's presidential campaign is moving toward the final stretch. It is being fought among three top contenders: Vice President Lien Chan of the Nationalist Party, Chen Shui-pien of the Democratic Progressive Party and James Soong, an independent. The second free, direct presidential election on March...
JAPAN
Jan 30, 2000

Tokyo barely balances budget despite spiking haloed items

The Tokyo governor has lost 7,000 supporters for his next election, promises marathon aficionado Taeko Hara.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 27, 2000

Restructuring, but with a human touch

CHIANG MAI, Thailand -- The most popular "buzzwords" in this time of change must surely be "globalization" and "restructuring." Allow me to indulge in one more reference to the latter with some remarks that may be quickly criticized as an example of "old-school, bureaucratic" thinking.
JAPAN
Jan 27, 2000

Corporate star aims to shake up UNHCR

Staff writer Despite large financial contributions made by the government to international causes, Japanese are often criticized for being invisible in the global community. Kiyoshi Murakami, who will become chief of the Career & Staff Support Service at the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for...
EDITORIALS
Jan 22, 2000

A mother's place is in the Diet

Babies are always news, but an even more special baby than usual is expected in Japan in April. Its mother is a news-maker herself: Diet member and former Olympic speed skater and cyclist Ms. Seiko Hashimoto. Dubbed a "superwoman" of Japanese athletics, Ms. Hashimoto competed in seven consecutive Olympics...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 22, 2000

Vision, not structure, is key to recovery

This is a time of unprecedented opportunity for Japan. It may seem strange to speak of opportunity when the country's political and economic experts are struggling with the challenges of structural change. However, I believe the current pessimism in the country is the result of two misconceptions.
JAPAN
Jan 21, 2000

Workers bullied out amid restructuring

Staff writer For a 32-year-old company employee in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward, the past two years have been a nightmare. And still, he does not know how to end it. Ever since he rejected his employer's request two years ago to voluntarily quit, he has been constantly harassed by bosses and colleagues. "The...
JAPAN
Jan 21, 2000

Tokyo cuts welfare, wages to trim budget

The financially strapped Tokyo Metropolitan Government on Friday unveiled an austere 5.98 trillion yen budget for fiscal 2000, a decrease of 4.9 percent from the current year and its smallest in 12 years. The belt-tightening was made possible after slashing social welfare expenditures, city employee...
COMMUNITY
Jan 20, 2000

Multifaceted legacy is rock solid

The public will never know what Ronald Winston looks like. Until he dies, that is.
EDITORIALS
Jan 19, 2000

Japan needs the presence of foreigners

Four years ago, central government officials and bureaucrats, especially at the Education Ministry, were expressing concern over the decreasing number of students from abroad coming to study at Japanese universities. The decline in students from neighboring Asian countries in particular, the first such...
EDITORIALS
Jan 16, 2000

Poor little rich kids

Here's a problem many of us might wish we had: being so rich that we have to start worrying about its effect on our children. It seems there are suddenly a lot more people around who fall into this category. So many, in fact, that the U.S. investment bank Merrill Lynch has reportedly begun offering psychiatric...
JAPAN
Jan 13, 2000

Kobe's recovery at 80%, but new industries still scarce

While Kobe has managed to rebuild its social infrastructure and housing facilities after the devastation of the Great Hanshin Earthquake of 1995, it must now develop new industries for its complete reconstruction, Mayor Kazutoshi Sasayama said in Tokyo Thursday. Speaking at the Japan National Press...
JAPAN
Jan 10, 2000

Youth likely to vote despite distrust

Many new adults polled Monday morning by The Japan Times said they would exercise their just-acquired right to vote in this year's Lower House election, but their comments also revealed mixed feelings toward politics and even outright distrust in lawmakers. "I'm going (to the polls), though I don't...
EDITORIALS
Jan 3, 2000

Soothing global economic jitters

Why, amid unmatched prosperity, is anxiety about future economic prospects so great? The framework that has guided international economic relations for the past 50 years has delivered results. What is behind the growing dissatisfaction with the international economic order, and what is to be done?
JAPAN
Jan 3, 2000

Competition for civil work rises amid recession

Amid a prolonged recession, only one in 13.1 test-takers passed local government exams to become civil servants in April 1999 -- the lowest success rate on record, a Home Affairs Ministry report said Monday. According to the report, the ratio of applicants for local government screening tests to those...
JAPAN
Dec 30, 1999

Complaints of shoddy new homes on rise

Staff writers Despite the colorful sofa and classy light fixtures, it's the long crack running along the ceiling and down the west wall of the living room that catches the eye. Sodden floorboards in the hallway further dampen the fresh feel that usually accompanies a newly built home. That's what one...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 26, 1999

Causes of Tokai disaster not so simple

In November, I visited JCO Co.'s nuclear fuel-processing plant -- a subsidiary of Sumitomo Metal Mining Co. -- where Sept. 30 a level-5 nuclear incident took place. The plant is located 110 km from Tokyo in the small town of Tokaimura, Ibaraki Prefecture. The plant is in an area that is a blend of residences...
JAPAN
Dec 24, 1999

Nose incinerator workers sue over dioxin

Six former workers of a garbage incineration facility in Nose, Osaka Prefecture, which is blamed for the nation's worst dioxin contamination, filed a lawsuit Friday against the central and local governments, demanding compensation for damaged health. The suit filed with the Osaka District Court is also...
JAPAN
Dec 21, 1999

Tokyo, Riyadh to sign deal on seat for Saudi Arabia at WTO

Staff writer Japan and Saudi Arabia are very likely to conclude a deal by next month on the oil-rich country's admission to the World Trade Organization, government sources said Tuesday. The agreement would be the first of its kind between Saudi Arabia and a major industrialized nation, the sources...
JAPAN
Dec 13, 1999

Century of Change: Marriage sheds its traditional shackles

Staff writer When Kumiko Nishimura wed two years ago, she thought that registering her marriage with the city office was a natural course of things. But she postponed the registration because she felt it too burdensome to go though the process of changing names on everything -- from her driver's license,...
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Dec 4, 1999

The buzz in Washington: New Millennium parties and would-be new presidents

WASHINGTON -- I experienced some interesting feelings as I typed in the date on this piece. We writers and pundits will have an emotional ride during the next few weeks as we put pen to paper -- or fingers to keyboard -- for the last time in this century and millennium. The temptations are rife: to be...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 1, 1999

'Trade is better than aid'

In one month's time, we shall leave the 20th century behind. The first half of it saw the world almost destroyed by war -- partly as a result of its division into rival trade blocs. The second half has seen an unprecedented expansion of world trade, which has also brought unprecedented economic growth....
CULTURE / Books
Nov 24, 1999

British bulldogs in a China shop

BRITAIN IN CHINA: Community, Culture and Colonialism 1900-1949, by Robert Bickers. Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 1999; 276 pp., 45 pounds (hardcover), 15.99 pounds (paper). When Lord Macartney opened his British Embassy in China in 1792, he was told to ask for bit of land or,...
JAPAN
Nov 23, 1999

Foreign carmakers wedge feet in door at Toyohashi

Staff writer

Longform

After pandemic-era border regulations eased, Indian migrants began returning to Japan. Their population now stands at more than 50,000 across the country.
How remote work is rewriting the migrant experience in Japan