Three firms and 10 of their former employees were found guilty Wednesday by the Tokyo High Court for maintaining a cartel in ductile pipes in violation of the Antimonopoly Law. Affected by the ruling were Osaka-based Kubota Corp. and Kurimoto Ltd., as well as Nippon Chutetsukan Co. of Tokyo. The companies were ordered to pay fines of 130 million yen, 70 million yen and 30 million yen, respectively. Presiding Judge Toshio Takagi said the companies' responsibility for restricting free market competition by adhering to old-fashioned business practices was grave. In addition to the fines, former officials of the three firms most deeply involved in the cartel all received suspended prison sentences ranging from six to 10 months.The market share agreement by the three companies affected products that were vital to public utilities and it had broad repercussions, the judge said. "The management at the firms were all lazy in not correcting the agreement, and the weight of responsibility lies heaviest with industry leader Kubota Corp., which was in a position to instruct the others," he continued. The defense had argued that competition was basically uninhibited in the indirect demand market among distributors, in which roughly 80 percent of the goods were handled. However, the court disagreed, saying competition was restricted in both the direct and indirect markets. It said the three firms had set market share for ductile pipes roughly 40 years ago. at 63 percent for Kubota, 27 percent for Kurimoto and 10 percent for Nippon Chutetsukan. The former officials indicted in the case were found to have made adjustments to the market share percentages in August 1996 and July 1997. Sugihara should be Japan's role model, expert says Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese diplomat known as "Japan's Schindler" for saving Nazi-persecuted Jews during World War II, is the type of person that Japanese people should try to be more like in the coming century, an American sociologist said Wednesday. Speaking at the Foreign Press Center in Tokyo, Hillel Levine explained that Sugihara is not a popular role-model among Japanese because his image is that of a cosmopolitan man who rebelled against his superiors. This does not match the image that most Japanese people have of themselves, said Levine. However, Levine said that Sugihara did not break rules but "stretched" them, adding that he acted in a very Japanese way. As the Japanese consul to Lithuania from July 1939 to August 1940, Sugihara issued about 10,000 transit visas to Jewish refugees in 1940. About half of the refugees eventually arrived in Japan. Asked if Sugihara was really Japan's Schindler, Levine said he was a "far better man than Schindler," saying that his deed was based on "love of life," while Schindler was a gambler. Levine said there might have been a "conspiracy of goodwill" behind Sugihara's efforts, involving a wide range of people including high-ranking officials of the Japanese and Russian governments. He added that the refugees were "extremely well-received by ordinary Japanese people" when they stopped in Kobe before heading for the United States.
