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November 30, 2024

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COMMENTARY / World

Oct 28, 2003

Coaxing Iran, North Korea

By W. Andy Knight

EDMONTON, Canada -- Since no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq, some critics of the Bush administration are suggesting that the use of the military option was premature or even unwarranted unless, of course, the goal all along was to overthrow a dangerous despot -- Saddam Hussein. Certainly,...

EDITORIALS

Oct 27, 2003

The reality of pension reform

With a general election around the corner, major political parties in Japan are playing up pension reform as a top campaign promise. That is only to be expected as the average age of the Japanese population rises at an accelerated pace. The question is what should and can be done to build a sustainable...

COMMENTARY

Oct 27, 2003

Ignorance is no longer bliss for China

By Frank Ching

HONG KONG -- U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton was understandably angry that her memoir, "Living History," was censored by the Beijing publisher who put out the Chinese edition. Her comments on the military crackdown in Tiananmen Square in 1989, on her experience at the 1995 United Nations conference...

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK

Oct 27, 2003

War perspective of poets oceans apart

By Hiroaki Sato

NEW YORK -- A gentleman named Paul Preusser, describing himself as "a composer and fresh graduate from the New England Conservatory," has recently written to ask if I could help him with poems of Kotaro Takamura (1883-1956). He has been commissioned to compose "a song cycle using poetry which is influenced...

COMMENTARY

Oct 27, 2003

Resuscitating Japanese labor

By Kiroku Hanai

Following a protracted economic slowdown, the labor movement in Japan is in the doldrums. The unionization rate has fallen to about 20 percent due to stepped-up corporate restructuring and widespread worker distrust of unions. The nation's top labor federation, the Japanese Trade Union Confederation,...

COMMENTARY

Oct 27, 2003

EU may bite off more than it can chew in euro-dollar rivalry

By David Howell

LONDON -- How fares Europe's single currency, the euro? Much too well.

EDITORIALS

Oct 26, 2003

Discord over LDP's retirement age

Age seems to matter in politics as well. With the Liberal Democratic Party having set a 73-year age limit for candidates running for Lower House seats under the proportional representation, or PR, system, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Thursday asked two elder politicians -- former Prime Ministers...

EDITORIALS

Oct 25, 2003

N. Korea: down but not out

BRUSSELS -- In the middle of Pyongyang, a new building attracts attention and customers. The Tong Il market is thronged with thousands of North Koreans haggling and buying from an extensive array of products. Fresh meat and dried fish, Spanish oranges and North African dates, suits, skirts, shoes and...

EDITORIALS

Oct 25, 2003

Iran makes a nuclear deal

A droit diplomacy by Britain, France and Germany may have averted another nuclear crisis. A diplomatic full press appears to have convinced Iran that suspending its uranium-enrichment program and coming into full compliance with its obligations to the International Atomic Energy Agency are in the country's...

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 25, 2003

Recipe for a leaner, keener Pentagon

By Richard Halloran

HONOLULU -- In a leaked memo that caused a stir in Washington and throughout the far-flung American military forces last week, U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld asked: "Is the DoD [Department of Defense] changing fast enough to meet the new 21st Century security environment?"

EDITORIALS

Oct 24, 2003

Mr. Mahathir and the Jews

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, under attack for telling a gathering of Islamic national leaders last week that "the Jews rule this world by proxy," has defended himself by saying that this and other remarks he made about Jews were taken out of context. They were.

COMMENTARY / World

Oct 24, 2003

Taiwan power rivals must win or perish

By Kanako Takahara

TAIPEI -- With five months to go before Taiwan's presidential election, the campaign is heating up between the incumbent, President Chen Shui-bian, leader of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, and the opposition Kuomintang's (KMT) Lien Chan.

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.

Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat

By Greg Dvorak

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Azabudai Hills, Tokyo’s green new downtown ‘village’

Azabudai Hills, Tokyo’s green new downtown ‘village’

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