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COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Sep 16, 2002

Foreign experts are part of the problem

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- One of Japan's problems in the global era arises from foreign academic experts on the country. The key qualification to be a foreign academic expert on Japan, or a "Japanologist," is to command the spoken and written language. Thus the late Professor G.C. Allen, who wrote some...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 14, 2002

Pyongyang summit light at end of tunnel?

When Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi engages in his historic summit in Pyongyang next Tuesday, he will have two major goals: learning the fate of the Japanese believed to have been abducted to North Korea, and setting the stage for the resumption of security dialogue between Pyongyang and Washington....
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Sep 14, 2002

Capt. Robert Guy

LONDON -- The Japan Society, founded in 1891, is the oldest organization in Britain concerned with Anglo-Japanese relationships. It grew out of a meeting a decade earlier of the International Congress of Orientalists. In over 90 events each year, and largely through a cluster of groups that focus on...
COMMENTARY
Sep 12, 2002

Brave trip to settle the past

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's one-day visit to North Korea on Sept. 17 is likely to have a profound effect on the security situation in Northeast Asia. The two nations started normalization talks in 1991, but thus far no substantial progress has been made because of the alleged abduction of Japanese...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Sep 5, 2002

Divorce issues, cheap traveling and getting ADSL

Divorce issues Dear Lifelines, My wife and I have been separated for three years. I do not see any hope for our marriage and feel we need to get a divorce. I have two children. What should I do? -- Tony in Chiba
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 5, 2002

Say no to global trade in education

The Ministry of Education will consider revising legislation governing the recognition of foreign universities in Japan as a wedge for opening Japan's education market to foreign institutions.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 4, 2002

U.S. alliance least served by genuflecting: expert

Japan needs to think strategically and hold dialogue with the United States in that light if it wants to be a true ally, according to a former deputy chief of the Defense Agency.
Japan Times
JAPAN / LEGACIES OF 9/11
Sep 4, 2002

Iraq issue casts shadow on post-9/11 solidarity

After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, two things crossed the mind of Shotaro Yachi of the Foreign Ministry: Japan must join the international community in condemning the acts, and must do everything possible to help the anticipated U.S. military response.
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Sep 2, 2002

Revival depends on openness, immigration

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- The late Shigeto Tsuru's "Japan's Capitalism: Creative Defeat and Beyond," which I referred to and quoted in my Aug. 26 column, urged Japan to "work hard, through both aid and trade, to wipe out the poverty that plagues the Third World."
JAPAN
Aug 31, 2002

Alleged abductees' kin hopeful, skeptical

Families of those believed to have been abducted to North Korea welcomed Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's plan to visit the Stalinist state next month as an opportunity to make some headway on the thorny issue.
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Aug 26, 2002

Emphasize the beauty for grand objectives

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- The best book on the modern Japanese political economy is the late Shigeto Tsuru's "Japan's Capitalism: Creative Defeat and Beyond," published by Cambridge University Press in 1993. Tsuru holds to the great original tradition of economics as a sub-branch of moral philosophy,...
BUSINESS
Aug 20, 2002

Nasdaq withdrawal blamed on prolonged economic slump

The head of Nasdaq's international operations reiterated Monday that the prolonged domestic slump was behind Nasdaq Stock Market Inc.'s decision to pull out of Japan.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Aug 17, 2002

Peter Grilli

Former longtime Tokyo residents Marcel and Elise Grilli left abiding imprints here. Over many years, Marcel wrote a column on music for The Japan Times. Elise, art critic for the newspaper, produced books of outstanding merit on the Japanese art scene. They came to Tokyo in the late 1940s with their...
JAPAN
Aug 17, 2002

Uncertainty overshadows Earth summit

The largest United Nations gathering in history is to start in Johannesburg in nine days' time, with nations reflecting on the progress -- or the lack of it -- toward achieving a more sustainable world over the past decade and wrangling over how to do a better job in the future.
JAPAN
Aug 14, 2002

Koizumi restraint sidelines Yasukuni row

One year ago, a diplomatic row erupted over Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visit to Yasukuni Shrine on Aug. 13 -- two days before the anniversary of Japan's surrender ending World War II -- in the face of protests from China and South Korea.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CLOSE NEIGHBORS
Aug 9, 2002

Asian appliance firms seek cracks in Japanese market

Customers shopping for TVs, refrigerators, microwave ovens and other electrical appliances are increasingly likely to come across brand names Galanz, Haier, LG and Samsung, which feature stylish designs and low prices that undercut those of their Japanese rivals.
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Aug 5, 2002

'Sick man' of the intellectual community

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- In the 1980s and early '90s, there were efforts on the part of Europeans and Japanese to strengthen their bilateral relationship. Europeans were conscious that they had neglected Japan, while the Japanese were seeking to expand their international networks at a time when the...
COMMUNITY
Aug 1, 2002

TV news move boosts campaign to secure international channel

On July 25th, in a stunning about face, News Corporation announced the continued broadcast of the 24-hour news channel, Foxnews.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Jul 25, 2002

Health insurance, pension cash claims and odd-job search

It's been quite surprising to receive so many "thank yous" from readers, but more surprising has been that they come not only from Japan but from all over the the world. It seems a lot of people who have lived in Japan in the past and moved on read the column at www.japantimes.co.jp to keep up on things...
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Jul 22, 2002

'Domesticists' rule amid idea drought

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- I do not live in Japan, although I first set foot (a rather small foot at 4 years old) on Japanese soil in 1949 and knew the country throughout the 1960s, '70s, '80s and '90s, when I either lived there temporarily or commuted frequently. My visits this century have been far fewer...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jul 21, 2002

Sailing in the world

Japan's area is less than that of California, though its economic exclusion zone takes in an enormous 4 million sq. km of ocean. The length of the coastline per sq. km of land is second only to Denmark, yet Japan's annual celebration of its partnership with the sea, Umi no Hi (Marine Day), rated hardly...
BUSINESS
Jul 12, 2002

FTA with Chile just isn't in the cards

Widely known as a feverish operagoer, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi may politely but disappointingly tell an exasperated Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, "Please wait patiently until the fat lady sings."
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Jul 8, 2002

Great country; pity about the institutions

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- My good friend Philippe Pons, the Japan correspondent for the leading French daily Le Monde, wrote an excellent article, "Au Japon, la crise n'est pas ce que l'on croit" (In Japan, the crisis is not what people think), for the newspaper's June 19 edition. Pons rectifies many...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 7, 2002

We love Korea (we just love Beckham more)

According to an Internet survey conducted by an Osaka polling service, 57 percent of Japanese people ages 18 to 49 feel that the recent World Cup tournament helped improve relations between the two co-hosting countries, Japan and the Republic of Korea. The media, both here and abroad, and FIFA, are making...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 1, 2002

Arrangement keeps Hong Kong on track

Since assuming the post of principal representative for the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Tokyo a little more than a month ago, I have found tremendous interest here in what has been happening to Hong Kong following its reunification with China on July 1, 1997. About five years before reunification,...
COMMENTARY / JAPAN IN THE GLOBAL ERA
Jul 1, 2002

Scapegoat seekers fuel nation's decline

LAUSANNE, Switzerland -- It is natural when one has domestic problems to look for foreign scapegoats. The United States' paranoia over Japan's trade surplus and foreign-investment binge in the 1980s is a good example. While most nations reflect this general syndrome up to a point, the Japanese seem to...
EDITORIALS
Jun 29, 2002

Economic policy for East Asia

The future of Japan's economy is tied to that of East Asia. China, the "factory of the world," is rising rapidly while newly industrialized countries such as South Korea and Taiwan are catching up with Japan. The challenge for this nation is to define and secure its place in this region of vast economic...
JAPAN
Jun 29, 2002

Growing minority blurs borders of Chinatowns

In 1919, 15-year-old Zeng Yaoquan from Guang Dong Province, southern China, arrived at Yokohama port to work as a servant at a trading house that imported rice and other crops from China, run by one of his relatives.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 25, 2002

Shenyang highlights bilateral problems

BEIJING -- Although the furor raised by the two-week dispute over the Shenyang incident has died down, it has not entirely dissipated -- particularly in Japan. The incident highlighted Japan's sensitivity toward China's growing power, and demonstrated that if frictions in this area are not effectively...

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A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami