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COMMENTARY / Japan / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Jan 26, 2015

Sex slave wrangling misses human picture

When a dispute arises between the South Korea and Japan, such as the 'comfort women' controversy, the South Koreans who most fiercely criticize Japan are 'liberals' while the Japanese who criticize South Korea are 'conservative rightists.'
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 26, 2015

Diet session opens with focus on security as hostage crisis continues

The Diet opens with expectations for the Abe administration to focus on security legislation in his quest to get the Japanese military more 'proactively' involved overseas.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jan 26, 2015

Where's the milk? School lunches no longer sacred cows

The cost of a school lunch is now higher than the average salaryman's lunch.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jan 24, 2015

Senior U.S. diplomat ruffles Cuba by meeting dissidents

A senior U.S. diplomat in Cuba for negotiations on restoring long-frozen diplomatic relations met a group of dissidents on Friday, seeking to underline Washington's concern over human rights but irritating the island's communist government.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Jan 23, 2015

There's an etiquette to dealing with bouts of flu

If you think that etiquette is limited to which fork to use, think again. Etiquette is simply kindness with a heavy helping of common sense. That's why etiquette helps get things done, and it responds to what's going on in the world at any given time.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 22, 2015

Scholar offers secure way for employees to blow the whistle

One man is on a quest to create transparency in Japan with a whistleblower website that has echoes of Wikileaks and promises high-tech anonymity.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jan 22, 2015

Improved 'competitiveness' key to wage hikes, labor chief says

Restoring industrial competitiveness is the key to fueling wage gains that the Abe government and the central bank are counting on to ensure inflation takes hold, according to labor minister Yasuhisa Shiozaki.
COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Jan 21, 2015

Abe targets Finance Ministry

Angered by its resistance to some of his policy measures, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appears bent on curbing the power of the Finance Ministry.
JAPAN / DAVOS SPECIAL 2015
Jan 21, 2015

Adaptation vital in changing world

Kiyoshi Kurokawa, a professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies and former chairman of the National Diet of Japan Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission, says the world is currently experiencing the most dramatic shift since the Industrial Revolution in the...
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Jan 20, 2015

Transgender sex workers face tide of abuse in China

Xiao Tong was selling sex on the streets of Beijing when a man lured her into his car, flashed his police badge and took her to the station.
EDITORIALS
Jan 19, 2015

Okada has his work cut out

Katsuya Okada, the new leader of the Democratic Party of Japan, had better set a clear policy direction for Japan's largest opposition party if he hopes to have it come back from its 2012 fall from power.
COMMENTARY
Jan 19, 2015

New Sri Lankan president has delicate balancing act

Sri Lankans have sprung a surprise with their commitment to democracy. They have thrown out a strongman president who had brought an end to a three-decade-long civil war and restored high economic growth.
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 18, 2015

Okada defeats Hosono to win DPJ presidential election

Following a close runoff against Goshi Hosono, Katsuya Okada is elected president of the Democratic Party of Japan.
EDITORIALS
Jan 18, 2015

Rajapaksa's surprise

While the new president of Sri Lanka, Maithripala Sirisena, says he wants to build a nation based on Buddhist principles of nonviolence and compassion, it is not clear if he is prepared to investigate charges that war crimes were committed during the 26-year-long civil war with the Tamil Tigers.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Jan 17, 2015

'Refugees should have the same opportunities in life as everyone else'

What do Nobel laureate Albert Einstein, composer Frederic Chopin, war photographer Robert Capa and psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud have in common? They were all refugees.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 17, 2015

Snark levels were on full blast for 'Kohaku'

The 2014 edition of NHK's venerated song contest, "Kohaku Uta Gassen," broadcast on Dec. 31, was remarkable for several reasons, though the performance that generated the most remarks was the one by the equally venerated pop-rock group Southern All Stars, their first on the show in 31 years.
COMMENTARY / World / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 17, 2015

Sri Lanka votes against fear and kleptocracy

The stunning ouster of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Jan. 8 was good news for that island nation of 20 million, and further evidence of a universal yearning for good governance.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health
Jan 17, 2015

Kids do better when they go to preschool all day

Full-day preschool may prepare children better for learning and social development than part- time programs, new research showed, bolstering the case for putting kids in classrooms at younger ages.
JAPAN / Society
Jan 16, 2015

Uniqlo vows reforms as NGO deplores factory conditions in China

Fast Retailing moves to improve poor working conditions at Uniqlo's clothing plants in China after being confronted by an NGO in Hong Kong.
EDITORIALS
Jan 16, 2015

The Kobe quake, 20 years on

A new generation has grown up since the Great Hanshin Earthquake of Jan. 17, 1995 — the first mega-quake to hit a large metro area in postwar Japan — and we still have much to learn from the experience.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Jan 16, 2015

Macau sex ring bust shows China expanding crackdown on graft

The arrest of a prominent Macau executive in the largest prostitution bust in the city's history shows Chinese President Xi Jinping is broadening his crackdown on corruption to restrict even long-tolerated vices.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 14, 2015

The Judge: 'works better if you're a well-to-do, over-40 male'

There is a point in a woman's life — specifically, mine — when surprises in movies and in dates are just not all that welcome anymore. Which is why "The Judge" is a vehicle to like — very, very much. Robert Downey Jr. faces off with Robert Duvall in a patriarchal, angst-ridden mystery thriller...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Jan 14, 2015

A note of concern to wounded MLK from a friend in Japan

Throughout Martin Luther King Jr.'s pursuit of justice and equal rights for African-Americans, he knew he had the support and consideration of Japan through an old classmate who had decided to study abroad and broaden his cultural understanding.
JAPAN
Jan 14, 2015

State secrets law could constrain researchers

The spirit of Japan's new state secrets law may officially be about protecting national security, but lawyers say it could affect a broad range of academic research as well.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jan 14, 2015

U.S. bartender contemplated poisoning Republican leader Boehner at country club

An Ohio bartender suspected of wanting to poison U.S. House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner has been charged with threatening to murder the Republican leader, court documents showed on Tuesday.

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