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JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Feb 28, 2012

Immigration inmates live life of limbo, at officials' whim

Abubakar Awudu Suraj spent 20 months in an Immigration Bureau detention center before being manhandled onto a jetliner at Narita airport for deportation back to Ghana in March 2010.
COMMENTARY
Feb 27, 2012

Tradeoff in nuclear power

Trade and industry minister Yukio Edano was quoted by a major vernacular paper earlier this year as saying that the government is contemplating changing the policy of promoting nuclear power generation as a national project in which operations are entrusted to private sector electric power companies....
JAPAN
Feb 23, 2012

Nagoya mayor won't budge on Nanjing remark

Nagoya Mayor Takashi Kawamura on Wednesday refused to retract his contentious comments about the veracity of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre and said he is ready to visit the city to explain his views.
JAPAN
Feb 22, 2012

'Thank You' visitor campaign starts

The Japan Tourism Agency kicked off a campaign Tuesday to woo foreign visitors as a gesture of thanks for the global support that poured in after the March 11 disasters, agency Commissioner Hiroshi Mizohata said.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Feb 21, 2012

S&P affirms AA- rating, says downgrade likely

Standard and Poor's on Monday affirmed Japan's sovereign-debt rating at AA- while maintaining a negative outlook and warning that a downgrade is likely if medium-term growth prospects weaken.
COMMENTARY
Feb 20, 2012

Media and law enforcement

The revelation last year that journalists at the News of the World, a Sunday paper, owned by News Corp., had been involved extensively in hacking into the mobile phones and the voice mail of celebrities led to the closure of this populist paper. Since such hacking is illegal in Britain, News Corp. has...
Reader Mail
Feb 19, 2012

Time to send U.S. forces packing

Regarding the Feb. 14 front-page Kyodo article "Okinawa marines not Iwakuni-bound": Get the U.S. forces out of Japan. World War II ended almost 70 years ago. Japan does not need U.S. forces based there. All the United States is doing is bullying Japan and other countries, using economic sanctions and...
JAPAN
Feb 18, 2012

Reform means the world for Todai

When Japan's leading university announced in January that it intends to shift undergraduate enrollment from spring to autumn in line with colleges worldwide, the plan created waves far beyond the academic world.
BUSINESS
Feb 15, 2012

BOJ targets inflation of 1%, boosts easing

The Bank of Japan on Tuesday stepped up its monetary easing measures, breaking with precedent to announce an explicit consumer price inflation target of 1 percent, while plowing a further ¥10 trillion into its asset purchase program.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 15, 2012

Store debuts Zambia bamboo bikes

A bicycle shop in Tokyo's Harajuku district has started selling bikes with bamboo frames made in Zambia, hoping riders hop on.
Reader Mail
Feb 12, 2012

Nursing-care tests raise dilemma

The Jan. 31 article "Foreigners' poor test grades force rethink on nurse tests" does raise a dilemma: Should Japan, or should it not, make the nurse certification test easier for foreigners? It may come down to answering the following questions:
CULTURE / Books
Feb 12, 2012

Commuter love affair, Tokyo tales

TOKYO COMMUTE: Japanese Customs and Way of Life Viewed from the Odakyu Line, by A. Robert Lee. Renaissance Books, 2011, 214 pp., $22 (paper) Arrive in Tokyo via airport train, as most travelers do, and it quickly becomes apparent that the city's lifeblood is its world-class railway network, each line...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 12, 2012

A glint of copper hints at Fukiya's mining past

Sitting in sublime obscurity in a raised valley one hour by bus from Bitchu-Takahashi, Fukiya Furusato Mura in Okayama Prefecture must surely be one of Japan's most under-appreciated rural destinations. Mention the name even to Japanese travelers and you are likely to draw blank expressions.
EDITORIALS
Feb 11, 2012

Futenma problem festers

Japan and the United States on Feb. 8 announced a joint statement to revise a 2006 agreement on realignment of the U.S. armed forces in Japan. The agreement linked (1) the transfer of U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from the densely populated Ginowan in Okinawa Island to less populated Henoko on...
Reader Mail
Feb 9, 2012

Wider road to family medicine

Regarding the Jan. 10 editorial "Improving medical services": In order to achieve better medical services, Japan needs to create an effective family medicine system. Because of (1) distorted medical school curricula that place too much weight on specialization and (2) an educational system that enables...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 9, 2012

Goth-Trad hatches postdisaster pop

Talking with Takeaki Maruyama in a Tokyo cafe, I'm caught off guard when the dubstep artist better known as Goth-Trad suggests that his fourth and latest album is pop. When I let it sink in, though, I realize that "New Epoch" could in fact be the perfect postdisaster-pop album.
EDITORIALS
Feb 7, 2012

Questions over stress tests

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) on Jan. 18 judged "appropriate" the results of the stress tests of the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at Kansai Electric Power Co.'s Oi nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture. On Jan. 31, an International Atomic Energy Agency team determined that Japan's stress...
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Feb 7, 2012

Bubble era's aviation legacy: Too many airports, all ailing

Japan has 98 airports, and most of them are operating in the red as a result of exaggerated demand forecasts and rampant, costly and arguably pork-barrel construction projects.

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji