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JAPAN
Apr 7, 2009

Aso orders ¥10 trillion in stimulus

Determined to get the economy off the ropes, Prime Minister Taro Aso has ordered Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano to put together a stimulus package that would see actual spending in excess of ¥10 trillion, equivalent to more than 2 percent of the nation's gross domestic product, Yosano said Monday.
JAPAN
Apr 7, 2009

Tokyo's mood mixed over rocket launch

There was a mixture of anger and surprise on the streets of Tokyo on Monday over North Korea's rocket launch.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Apr 7, 2009

Prosecutors boast clout, success

Prosecutors are legal professionals who work for the state and represent the public interest. They have the authority to investigate any crime and indict and try alleged offenders.
JAPAN
Apr 6, 2009

North Korea fires rocket over Tohoku

North Korea fired a long-range rocket over the Tohoku region Sunday, but Japan did not try to shoot it down because its debris posed no threat to Japanese territory.
JAPAN
Apr 5, 2009

No need to keep vigil of sky for falling objects: Kawamura

Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura assured the public Saturday that there was little chance that part of the rocket North Korean plans to send over the country will actually fall on Japanese soil.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 5, 2009

Deciphering 'A Page of Madness'

Teinosuke Kinugasa's "A Page of Madness" ("Kurutta Ichipeiji," 1926) was long thought lost. Only some 75 years later did the discovery of the missing negative allow the picture to be finally viewed by the present generation. At the same time there emerged a critical need to evaluate it because it seemed...
JAPAN
Apr 5, 2009

Two false alarms leave Japan egg-faced

North Korea may have spent Saturday toying with a jumpy Japan over its plan to send a rocket over the Tohoku region, but it managed to cause a meteoric embarrassment to Tokyo — twice — without ever pushing the launch button.
COMMENTARY
Apr 3, 2009

Netanyahu's fig leaf buffer

LONDON — "I am not afraid of Bibi (Netanyahu). I will not be anybody's fig leaf," said Ehud Barak, leader of Israel's Labor Party, defending his decision to join the hard-right coalition government formed by Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu. But off in the distance there was a curious whirring noise....
Reader Mail
Apr 2, 2009

Generalizations invite challenge

Debito Arudou does paint a bleak picture of the travails of many foreigners at the hands of the Japanese legal system. I do have issues with a couple of his points, though. First, he asserts that "bail [is] impossible for non-Japanese to get." Yet, simply typing "foreigner bail" into The Japan Times'...
COMMENTARY
Apr 2, 2009

Women should lead Russia

Do not underestimate Russia. That is just what many commentators are doing these days as they look at its declining population, its collapsing stock market, its dangerous reliance on oil and gas exports, the dismal style of its political leadership, its docile parliament, its aggressive foreign policy,...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / SOUTH KOREAN JOURNALIST SYMPOSIUM
Apr 1, 2009

Worldwide recession exposes cracks in South Korean society

The continuing decline of the middle class and increase in the ranks of the poor threaten to exacerbate South Korea's demographic woes, Kim Dong Seop, an editorial writer for the Chonsun Ilbo daily, told the March 13 symposium.
EDITORIALS
Mar 29, 2009

Supporting single mothers

As the economy worsens, some people will suffer more than others. For the first time ever, the number of Japanese single mothers receiving child-care allowances to supplement their low income has topped 1 million, the health and welfare ministry reported in March. These single-mother households greatly...
JAPAN
Mar 28, 2009

Ruling bloc rams '09 budget through Diet

The ruling bloc enacted the ¥88 trillion fiscal 2009 budget, the biggest ever, and related bills by using its huge majority to ram them through the more powerful Lower House Friday, after they had been earlier rejected by the opposition-controlled Upper House.
JAPAN
Mar 28, 2009

SDF gets intercept order

Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada ordered the Self-Defense Forces on Friday to shoot down any part of a North Korean rocket that might fall toward Japanese territory.
COMMENTARY
Mar 27, 2009

Perks of the warring states

WATERLOO, Ontario — Since the end of World War II, America, Britain and Israel have been among the countries most heavily involved in war and armed conflict. Don't expect to see any of their political or military leaders in an international criminal dock anytime soon.

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past