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Japan Times
TENNIS
Sep 18, 2008

Jankovic relishes chance to compete for top ranking

Jelena Jankovic is determined to draw strength from her U.S. Open final defeat and regain the top spot in the world rankings at this week's Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Sep 17, 2008

Przewalski's Horses running free in Mongolia

Imagine, if you can, the prehistoric cave-wall images of Lascaux in France springing to life, the animal likenesses breaking free of their multimillennia entrapment in pigment and rock.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 15, 2008

Bailout raises moral issues

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — The United States government's takeover of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac constitutes a huge bailout of these institutions' creditors, whose losses have ballooned as house prices continue to plummet. With the government now fully guaranteeing Fannie's and Freddie's debts,...
EDITORIALS
Sep 14, 2008

Worrisome NSG agreement

India has won a significant victory in its efforts to claim an exception to rules designed to thwart the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Delhi did not accomplish this on its own: It got considerable help from Washington, which seeks to build a new relationship with the world's largest democracy.
MORE SPORTS
Sep 9, 2008

Powell wins but misses Bolt's mark

RIETI, Italy (AP) Asafa Powell won the 100 meters at the Rieti Grand Prix in 9.82 seconds on Sunday, failing to reprise his world-record effort at the meet last year.
EDITORIALS
Sep 7, 2008

Responding to Russia

The Russian government made two bets when it sent troops into South Ossetia and Georgia last month. The first — that Russian forces could crush any opposition — was a pretty safe bet. While the Russian military has deteriorated significantly since the Cold War, it has more than enough firepower to...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 4, 2008

Katsura Funakoshi's sphinxes of suggestivity

The figure is nothing if not startling: Truncated just above the knees and suspended on four, bark-covered sticks sprouting from the body, sculptor Katsura Funakoshi's "The Sphinx Floats in Forest" is a muscular hermaphrodite with full, female breasts and male genitalia, an elongated neck and leather-strap...
JAPAN
Aug 30, 2008

Conferees call for unity on nonproliferation

SAITAMA — Ongoing discussions and a more muscular nuclear nonproliferation treaty are vital to achieving progress in disarmament efforts, speakers and participants at a U.N. conference in Saitama agreed Friday.
COMMENTARY
Aug 27, 2008

Showcasing best of China

It's been like watching the coverage of the Beijing Olympics on a split screen. Much of the Western media comment in the main news and opinion pages has been written up by the "nattering nabobs of negativism," in the immortal words of Vice President Spiro Agnew (albeit written by William Safire). The...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 21, 2008

Moscow called West's bluff

Forty years ago this week, the night sky above Prague began to rumble with the sound of transport aircraft. On distant frontiers, tanks lurched forward. The invasion of Czechoslovakia had begun.
Reader Mail
Aug 21, 2008

Food crisis born of distribution

I am puzzled that The Japan Times would have an economist comment on agricultural science and the natural environment, as in Takamitsu Sawa's Aug. 18 article, "Natural enemy of warming." Sawa argues that drought in Australia, spiraling food prices, biofuels and their consequences are driving companies...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 20, 2008

From Prague Spring to the Velvet Revolution

WARSAW — What was the Prague Spring, or the events of 1968 more generally? Their meaning, it seems, has become more, not less, debatable with the passage of time.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 16, 2008

Japan urged to be creative to stay competitive

In contrast to fast-growing Asian economies like China and India, Japan's slow pace of economic reform coupled with its graying population and shrinking workforce is a concern to Western investors.
EDITORIALS
Aug 12, 2008

Right to reproductive health

At a time when the attention of the international community is focused on climate change and soaring food prices, it is all too easy to overlook problems fueled by the world's rapidly growing population. It should be remembered that the world will not be able to solve the problems of global warming and...
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Aug 12, 2008

It's ghost season in Japan — who you gonna call?

If there are eerie goings-on in the neighborhood — and Halloween is still two months off — it could be because Japan's traditional "ghost season" maxes out at this time of the year.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 12, 2008

Artist puts a happy face on Olympics

Pictured on umbrellas paraded at the event, the happy faces of more than 1,000 children from around the world adorned Friday's opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympics at the Beijing National Stadium, otherwise known as the Bird's Nest.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Aug 12, 2008

It's ghost season in Japan — who you gonna call?

If there are eerie goings-on in the neighborhood — and Halloween is still two months off — it could be because Japan's traditional "ghost season" maxes out at this time of the year.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Aug 10, 2008

Engineering a historical oblivion for soldiers of the wrong wars

My dad was a lucky man. Born in 1903, he was just too young for service in World War I and a bit too old for the same in World War II. Not that he couldn't have volunteered for the latter. He certainly could have, but decided not to.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Aug 8, 2008

Taking the Japan Wine Challenge

Despite the countless half- finished bottles of wine that lined the walls, the atmosphere in the plush function room of Tokyo's Sheraton Hotel was decidedly tense rather than tipsy. Japanese and Westerners were sitting around tables deep in concentration, thoughtfully holding a glass up to the light...
COMMENTARY
Jul 13, 2008

Cigarettes, lies and impressionable film fans

MADRAS, India — Humphrey Bogart used to seduce women through his smoke rings. In a movie like "Casablanca," much of this Hollywood star's playboy persona came from the cigarette he held between his fingers. That the tobacco stick finally finished him is something that all his fans, especially female,...
EDITORIALS
Jul 10, 2008

A modest step forward

The Group of Eight leaders have reached an agreement on efforts to fight global warming, a main topic at their summit this week in Toyako, Hokkaido.
JAPAN / G8 SUMMIT 2008
Jul 9, 2008

Staid events said losing relevancy

TOYAKO, Hokkaido — The three-day Toyako G8 summit will become history when it wraps up Wednesday. But with its conclusion, a growing number of critics are demanding that the whole concept of the summits becomes a thing of the past.
JAPAN
Jul 6, 2008

Glimpses into Japan's frontier

Hokkaido is seen as a prefecture apart, where the vastnesses are vaster, the wilds wilder and the splendor more splendid than anywhere else in Japan. The Group of Eight summit attendees and other summer visitors will have a chance to see for themselves at the 11 national or quasi-national parks in Hokkaido,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 4, 2008

Fans raise $50,000 for Japanese band

To most bands, it sounds like a dream come true: $50,000 with no strings attached; the opportunity to record an album with one of the world's top engineers; and the freedom to make any kind of record you want, unhindered by interfering labels just waiting to drop you at the first sniff of commercial...
Japan Times
Reference / Special Presentations / WITNESS TO WAR
Jul 2, 2008

Finding Papua war dead a vet's life

20th in a series

Longform

In 2020, 38% of all households were single-person. That figure is projected to rise to 44.3% by 2050.
The rise of AI companionship in a lonely Japan