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JAPAN
Oct 22, 2004

50 million yen donation cap considered

The Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner, the New Komeito, agreed Thursday to put an annual cap of 50 million yen on donations by registered political groups other than political parties and their fund management bodies, coalition lawmakers said.
JAPAN
Oct 22, 2004

State might dip into reserve funds to repair typhoon damage

The chief Cabinet secretary said Thursday that the government might use reserve funds in the general-account budget for fiscal 2004, rather than creating a supplementary budget, to deal with the serious damage brought by Typhoon Tokage.
JAPAN
Oct 20, 2004

Takebe, 78 other lawmakers visit Yasukuni for fall festival

Seventy-nine lawmakers, including Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Tsutomu Takebe, visited Yasukuni Shrine on Tuesday for its annual fall festival.
BUSINESS
Oct 20, 2004

Income tax cuts may be scaled back: Tanigaki

Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said Tuesday the government will consider scaling back income tax cuts that have been in place since 1999 because economic recovery has taken root.
JAPAN
Oct 20, 2004

Noono delays Diet session with unsure responses

Opposition lawmakers on Tuesday questioned Chieko Noono's credentials to be justice minister after she repeatedly gave contradictory statements over a political funding scandal.
BUSINESS
Oct 19, 2004

Diplomatic war over gas rumbles on

Japan will ask China to halt natural gas exploration projects if they encroach on Japan's economic waters, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said Monday.
COMMENTARY
Oct 18, 2004

Balancing work with other ways of life

LONDON -- Alan Milburn, the British secretary of state for health, resigned last year to "spend more time with his family." This excuse has often been used to cover some misdemeanor or a falling out with colleagues, but in this case it seems to have been genuine.
JAPAN
Oct 17, 2004

Most prefectures to continue blanket testing for mad cow

Most prefectural governments plan to continue testing all cattle for mad cow disease, despite the national government's plan to exclude cows aged up to 20 months possibly by next spring.
JAPAN
Oct 17, 2004

Photo seen as abduction evidence

A woman in a photograph smuggled out of North Korea is likely to be Teruko Kase, who disappeared in Chiba Prefecture some 40 years ago, according to a preliminary expert examination.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 16, 2004

Top court holds state to account for Minamata

The Supreme Court on Friday held the state responsible for the spread of Minamata disease after January 1960.
JAPAN
Oct 16, 2004

Eyebrows, hackles raised as Koizumi backs Bush

The top government spokesman on Friday rushed to play down a suggestion by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi that he was backing U.S. President George W. Bush ahead of the Nov. 2 election.
JAPAN
Oct 15, 2004

Reports of Iraq killings prove false

Government officials were bombarded by inquiries from the public and media on Wednesday night and early Thursday morning following bogus online reports that two Japanese had been killed or injured in Iraq.
BUSINESS
Oct 15, 2004

IRCJ begins assessing struggling Daiei's assets

The state-backed Industrial Revitalization Corp. of Japan began a full-scale evaluation of Daiei Inc.'s assets Thursday, a day after the ailing retailer decided to seek its help instead of using only private-sector funds.
JAPAN
Oct 15, 2004

Former Hashimoto faction paralyzed

The largest faction of the Liberal Democratic Party remains paralyzed as it struggles to find a successor to its scandal-tainted former leader, former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto.
JAPAN
Oct 14, 2004

Banks force Daiei into climbdown, arms of IRCJ

Pressure from creditor banks has forced debt-ridden retailer Daiei Inc. into deciding to seek help from the Industrial Revitalization Corp. of Japan, officials said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 2004

Violence in Iraq holding back foreign aid

When Mohammad Ali-Hassan, the governor of Al-Muthanna Province in southern Iraq, visited Tokyo last week, he thanked Japan for the aid it has given to his province, where Ground Self-Defense Force troops have been deployed.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 2004

Japan, U.S. to speed up military talks

Japan and the United States agreed Tuesday to speed up bilateral talks on a planned review of the U.S. military deployment in Japan. Vice Foreign Minister Yukio Takeuchi and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage reached this agreement during sub-Cabinet-level talks, according to a Japanese...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 2004

Koizumi opens Diet session with pledge to stick to reforms

A 53-day extraordinary Diet session began Tuesday, with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi reiterating his determination to stick to his administrative reform initiatives, including the privatization of Japan's postal services.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 13, 2004

Hashimoto to face Diet grilling over scandal

Former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto said Tuesday he is ready to appear before the House of Representatives political ethics council to explain his alleged involvement in a recent scandal involving donations from the Japan Dental Association.
BUSINESS
Oct 13, 2004

BSE blanket testing may end in the spring

The government may soften its blanket testing procedures for mad cow disease next spring, limiting the tests to cattle aged 21 months and older, government officials said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Oct 11, 2004

Missile shield research to enter development stage

Japan has decided to develop components for interceptor missiles with the U.S. amid pressure from Washington to move forward from joint technological research on a missile defense system to the development stage, government sources said Sunday.
EDITORIALS
Oct 11, 2004

Almost all wrong on Iraq

Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction. While he certainly harbored ambitions to get them, the Iraqi programs to build them had decayed to become mere wisps of what they once were. That is the conclusion of the final report, released last week, of the chief U.S. weapons hunter, Mr. Charles...
JAPAN
Oct 9, 2004

Ichiro refuses national award for second time

Baseball superstar Ichiro Suzuki has done it again.
BUSINESS
Oct 9, 2004

Worker confidence down in September

Business confidence among workers with jobs sensitive to economic trends worsened in September for the second month, sending a closely watched index below the key threshold for the first time in eight months, the government said Friday.
JAPAN
Oct 9, 2004

WMD revelation has Japan scrambling for new excuses

The United States' recent conclusion that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has raised the question of whether Japan will now face up to the facts.
JAPAN
Oct 9, 2004

Pyongyang to host next round of abduction talks

North Korea agreed Friday to a request from Japan to hold a meeting in Pyongyang in mid-November on the abduction issue, according to Seiken Sugiura, deputy chief Cabinet secretary.
EDITORIALS
Oct 8, 2004

Kyoto Protocol comes to life

In a surprise move, the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin has decided to endorse the ratification of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Environmentalists worldwide hailed the move, which allows the Kyoto agreement to go into effect. In fact, the Russian decision owes less to environmental calculations...

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.