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Akemi Nakamura
JAPAN
Jan 11, 2008
Reaching a resolution on 'balance billing' won't come soon
The government's ban on health insurance coverage of medical treatment provided in combination with uninsured therapy creates unnecessary financial problems for patients who need the uninsured but advanced treatment, critics charge.
Japan Times
JAPAN / THIS FOREIGN LAND
Jan 3, 2008
Flexible and diverse, international schools thrive
Second in a series
JAPAN
Dec 15, 2007
Pair share eco-friendly role model goals
they don't have any prejudice toward foreigners. Satoko: When I quarreled with him (before marriage), my parents told me I am the closest person to Peo and have to support him.
Japan Times
JAPAN / READERS' FUND
Dec 12, 2007
Kyoto NGO works to boost Afghan women's lot, literacy
This is the first in a series on how contributions to The Japan Times Readers' Fund last year — the 52nd since the campaign started — are being put to use. Readers donated ¥1,191,888 in 2006, which has gone to six groups helping needy people across Asia.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 5, 2007
Hepatitis disaster another warning ignored
Ikuko Kuno gave birth to her first son at a maternity hospital in Ise, Mie Prefecture, in May 1988. The only thing different from when she gave birth to her daughter in 1986 was that the obstetrician gave her a blood-clotting agent to stop her hemorrhaging.
Japan Times
JAPAN / MIXED MATCHES
Dec 1, 2007
Bond forged in Nepal still going strong
Praveen Lama and Kazuko Tanikawa have lived in a bustling shopping street in Tokyo's Kita Ward since July 2003, when the Nepalese married his Japanese wife after a long-distance love affair that lasted several years through e-mails and phone calls.
JAPAN
Nov 22, 2007
Elderly play key role in society's safety net: study
pension. If they have money enough to spare, they give the spillover to their children's families," Ogawa said. "So the elderly have played a key role as a safety net in Japanese society." Ogawa's study took into account the national transfer accounts system, which was devised two years ago by a group...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 10, 2007
Foreigners still dogged by housing barriers
Having arrived in Tokyo from Seoul about a year ago, Im Yeong Eun, like many foreigners who come to Japan, soon encountered a major difficulty — housing discrimination.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Oct 30, 2007
Textbook screening — not always on same page
The spotlight has fallen again on textbook screening as people in Okinawa denounce the government's March instruction that publishers delete descriptions about the role the Imperial army played in ordering mass civilian suicides during the Battle of Okinawa.
JAPAN
Oct 17, 2007
Okinawans lobby in Tokyo for textbook changes
A group of 167 political leaders and activists from Okinawa urged the central government Tuesday to retract the education ministry's instruction to publishers to remove references to the military's role in forcing civilians to commit mass suicide during the Battle of Okinawa.
JAPAN
Sep 28, 2007
Tokai tasked with continuing education reforms
Fukuda to rebuild the education system," the 59-year-old Lower House member from Hyogo Prefecture said Wednesday. "As education is a pillar supporting a nation, I support this direction." The ministerial post, which Tokai assumed on Tuesday, is the lawmaker's first in a 21-year career. Begun under Abe,...
JAPAN
Sep 24, 2007
Public reaction mixed on nation's next leader
Aso lacks," Shuichi Minoike, a 29-year-old office worker from Chiba Prefecture, said at JR Akihabara Station. Minoike said he is optimistic Fukuda will "utilize his established skills" when he faces critical decisions as the next prime minister, including the debate over extending the Maritime Self-Defense...
JAPAN
Sep 15, 2007
Hope found in submarine legacy
and Katja Boonstra (left), who lost their fathers during World War II, visit William King, the former skipper of the British submarine HMS Telemachus, at Oranmore Castle in Ireland in May 2004. PHOTO COURTESY OF AKIRA TSURUKAME
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 13, 2007
English-language Web site gives voice to survivors of atomic bombs
Gleaning stories from countless hours of recordings made by the survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a former broadcast journalist started an English Web site last month to share their horrifying experiences with the outside world.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 12, 2007
Japan enters orbit of nations exploring the moon
The moon has languished in the shadows of space exploration since the heyday of manned missions in the 1960s and 1970s, eclipsed by projects focused on Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, not to mention the U.S. space shuttle and the International Space Station.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CABINET INTERVIEW
Sep 6, 2007
Work-life imbalance said birthrate's key foe
The key to turning around Japan's declining birthrate is to improve the work-life balance for both women and men, asserts Yoko Kamikawa, new state minister for population issues and gender equality.
Japan Times
JAPAN / ATOMIC POWER AT ANY COST
Sep 1, 2007
Nuclear doubts spread in wake of Niigata
Global competition for energy resources and tougher controls on greenhouse gas emissions have made Japan reliant on nuclear power. While the government and regional power utilities are quick to associate the word "safety" with atomic energy, several fatalities, accidents, coverups and earthquake threats...
JAPAN
Aug 24, 2007
Three more inmates sent to gallows
Three death-row inmates went to the gallows Thursday, bringing to 10 the number of hangings approved by Jinen Nagase during his 11 months as justice minister.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Aug 21, 2007
'Hanko' fate sealed by test of time
A "hanko" personal seal is a necessary item for most adults in Japan, serving the same role as a signature in the West.
Japan Times
Reference / Special Presentations / WITNESS TO WAR
Aug 18, 2007
Spared Korean war criminal pursues redress
Lee Hak Rae was stunned on March 20, 1947, when he stood in an Australian military court in Singapore and was sentenced to hang as a war criminal for the brutal treatment he was accused of inflicting on ailing Allied prisoners of war who were forced to build the infamous Death Railway to their last breath....

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Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?