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JAPAN
Jul 23, 2007

Nuclear power expansion takes direct hit

Japan's nuclear power industry is among the world's most ambitious. Spurred by fears of global warming, planners envision a rapid expansion of plants, capacity and cutting-edge technologies.
EDITORIALS
Jul 21, 2007

New warning on oil

Brace for another energy crisis. A new authoritative assessment forecasts sharply higher demand that will raise prices and increase reliance on the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and unstable regions for oil supplies. While some experts dismiss the analysis as alarmist, we need...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jul 18, 2007

Putting 'rarity' into context

Stepping outside this morning, I heard a skylark singing above the open field adjacent to where I live. It's a rare event for me, but perhaps you hear skylarks all the time. Then again, perhaps you have never heard that silvery cascade of notes pouring endlessly from high in the sky.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 5, 2007

Al Gore's misplaced priorities

PRAGUE — The organizers of next Saturday's Live Earth concerts hope that the entire world will hear a crystal clear message: Climate change is the most critical threat facing the planet. Planned by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, Live Earth will be the biggest, most mass-marketed show of celebrity...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Jul 1, 2007

Kotaro Sawaki: Writer on the road of life

Kotaro Sawaki is one of the most popular nonfiction writers in Japan. He made his name with "Shinya Tokkyu (Midnight Express)," a reportage of a yearlong overland trip through Asia and Europe he took when he was in his mid-20s. Those stories — whose title refers to a euphemism for "prison break" used...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 28, 2007

Feting Japan's finest animators

Omnibus films are hard sells to ticket buyers and critics; the former because they want a full cinematic meal, not a plate of hors d'oeuvres, the latter because they see a package of segments as a sort of horse race — and proclaim disappointment when all the horses/segments don't cross the finish line...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 27, 2007

Suribachi photog's grave hunted

A U.S. team is slashing its way through thick, thorny underbrush to find a cave where a marine combat photographer was believed killed by Japanese machinegun fire nine days after he filed the iconic World War II flag-raising 62 years ago on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwojima.
EDITORIALS
Jun 24, 2007

The new Silk Road

Over the past several years, institutes, programs and projects have been steadily rebuilding one of humankind's most amazing wonders — the Silk Road. As the disparate pieces of the Trans-Asian Railway and Asian Highway gradually start to link up, Japan should ensure that it is not left out of the developments....
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 22, 2007

Simpler treaty for EU's silent majority

LUXEMBOURG — At the European Union's summit this week, debate will center on whether to go forward with a "mini" EU Constitutional Treaty. That debate is the result of the rejection of the draft treaty by French and Dutch voters in 2005. But those "no" votes have obscured the fact that 18 of the EU's...
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 20, 2007

Don't underestimate Hamas' extremism

PRAGUE — Hamas' capture of the Gaza Strip has created, along with Iran, a second radical Islamist state in the Middle East. The region, probably the Arab-Israeli conflict and certainly the Palestinian movement will never be the same.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 15, 2007

'Zukan ni Notte Nai Mushi'

We all need to escape, once in a while, from being serious people in the real world, trying to ace the big test, land the big contract, or earn an Oscar nomination for best supporting actress. Rinko Kikuchi, who accomplished the last feat for her turn as a hearing-impaired high-school girl in "Babel,"...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 14, 2007

In step with nature, if not with celebrity

Renowned butoh dancer, award-winning actor, choreographer and agriculturist Min Tanaka has tried hard to escape international stardom.
SUMO / SUMO SCRIBBLINGS
Jun 12, 2007

Sumo at the Olympics or a dohyo too far?

Sumo in Japan is on the up and up. We now have two yokozuna with a good half decade of rivalry in the tanks, one young enough to still be around in 10 years time. Irrespective of reports in the Japanese-language media, the sport is not sinking into the abyss with the continued success of its foreign...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 10, 2007

Bunroku Shishi: Finding humor in a recovering postwar Japan

SCHOOL OF FREEDOM, by Bunroku Shishi, translated and with an afterword by Lynne E. Riggs. Center for Japanese Studies, The University of Michigan: Ann Arbor, 2006, 256 pp., $29.95 (cloth). Bunroku Shishi (1893-1969), who was born as Toyoo Iwata, had two occupations, just as he had two names. He was...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / U.K. JOURNALIST SYMPOSIUM
Jun 9, 2007

Sustained growth needs more access, ambition

Despite its demographic problems, Japan has room to aim at higher growth by pushing harder on reforms, opening up more to foreign capital and making better use of unused female labor, visiting journalists from Britain told a recent symposium in Tokyo.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 7, 2007

A midsummer bonanza

Many of the hottest tickets theatergoers are after this summer come courtesy of one person — English director John Caird.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 7, 2007

The cross-cultural theater connection

John Caird doesn't see his staging of three plays in Japan this summer as making a big splash that leaves ever-decreasing ripples that then fade away.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 5, 2007

Mirror images of arrogance

NEW YORK — This week's summit of the major Group of Eight nations will probably be the last such meeting for U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 20, 2007

Buy a car and drive up your grocery bill

Toyota Motor Corp. made headlines when it announced that its profit for 2006 was a record-breaking 2.24 trillion yen. In the United States, the news was greeted with some bitterness, since the Japan automaker had recently surpassed General Motors in terms of worldwide sales for the first time ever.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 3, 2007

Breakthrough women

In 18th- and 19th-century Japan, the presence of female artists in painting circles slowly increased until in the 20th century, social reforms allowed them access to secondary education and vocational schools as well as art training, patronage and chances to compete in national exhibitions.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 30, 2007

Entente to balance China

International politics is always shifting, basically affected by changes in the balance of power. Of all the factors that can change a balance of power, one that is unique to modern international society (since the 19th century) is the economic growth of a single country.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Apr 29, 2007

Spare a shudder in memory of an American 'ism' that lives on

This coming Wednesday, May 2, marks the 50th anniversary of the death of a venal and cowardly man, a true antihero of the 20th century.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 19, 2007

'Babel' role simply 'had to be me'

Rinko Kikuchi reveals how she clung to movies like a lifeline during her tumultuous teenage years, and now she views acting as her way of returning the favor -- while director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu says she was robbed of an Oscar
EDITORIALS
Apr 7, 2007

U.S. and South Korea make a deal

The United States and South Korea last week made the world's largest bilateral free-trade deal. It took 10 months of tough, point-by-point negotiations and officials worked to the very last minute. One measure of the sensitivities in both countries is that, days after the agreement was reached, the official...
MORE SPORTS
Mar 22, 2007

Oda struggled

NHK Trophy runnerup Nobunari Oda struggled in the men's short program and was in 8th place behind leader Jeffrey Buttle with six left to skate Wednesday afternoon at the World Figure Skating Championships.

Longform

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The rise of AI companionship in a lonely Japan