Search - weekly

 
 
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 29, 2011

Euro crisis significantly worse: top French banker

Bank of France Gov. Christian Noyer said the European crisis has worsened "significantly," as deepening investor concern over the region worsens market volatility.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Nov 22, 2011

Last trial brings dark Aum era to end

The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal by condemned killer Seiichi Endo, lowering the curtain on the trials over the cult's heinous crimes, which began in the 1980s and culminated in the 1995 nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Nov 16, 2011

Smartphones new security battlefield

Smartphones have become a global phenomenon and in Japan in particular people are rapidly replacing their old cellphones with new handsets that are more like small computers with ever-increasing applications.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 11, 2011

Risk-averse Noda shuns hallway interviews

Words are often the strongest weapon in a politician's armory, but the slightest slip of the tongue can turn into a huge liability, as evidenced by the number of occasions prime ministers and Cabinet members have been caught out in the last six years.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 8, 2011

Stunner: JCP skips Osaka mayor race

The Osaka mayoral campaign took an unexpected turn over the weekend as the Japanese Communist Party candidate dropped out and called on voters to support current Mayor Kunio Hiramatsu over former Osaka Gov. Toru Hashimoto.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Nov 8, 2011

Late-night restaurants ripe for robbery

"Gyudon" beef-on-rice restaurants belonging to the Sukiya chain have become a favorite target of robbers.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Nov 6, 2011

Penny-pinching on pensions threatens to raid retirees' nest eggs

Much of the global media's attention this week was turned toward the possibility of Greece's default. Its direct effect on Japan is difficult to foresee. On the one hand, the approximately ¥1 trillion in national bonds Japan holds from the fiscally ailing countries that are referred to collectively...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 1, 2011

Hashimoto bows out amid controversy

Toru Hashimoto finished his term Monday as Osaka governor, resigning three months early to run for mayor of the city of Osaka on Nov. 27.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 1, 2011

Japan needs a 'fresh start' to resolve lingering issues

Post-March 11 Japan faces the challenge of not just rebuilding from the damage of the massive earthquake and tsunami, but also tackling the nation's structural economic and political problems that have largely been left unresolved over the past two decades.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Oct 30, 2011

Less acclaim, more fun for Japan's Ig Nobel Prize winners

Since Hideki Yukawa in 1949, a total of 16 Japanese nationals have been named recipients of Nobel Prizes. In 2010, when the most recent Japanese winners were announced to receive prizes for chemistry, NHK interrupted its scheduled programming with a nyuusu sokuho (breaking news) announcement.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Oct 28, 2011

Shimane's Yamamoto plays a cerebral game

The Shimane Susanoo Magic have begun their second season in terrific fashion, winning four games on the road.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / INDIA-JAPAN SYMPOSIUM
Oct 24, 2011

India bids for closer East Asia ties for regional integration

India wants to play a role in the economic integration of Asia through closer ties with East Asian powers including China — despite a long history of political hostility — and Japan, journalists and experts from India said at a recent symposium in Tokyo.
CULTURE / Books
Oct 23, 2011

Documenting disaster

THE TOHOKU EARTHQUAKE and Tsunami, the Fukushima Nuclear Reactor, and How the World's Media Reported Them, by Eric Johnston. The Japan Times, 2011, 96 pp., ¥1,260 (paperback) Seven months after Japan's devastating March 11 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disasters, the jury remains out on media reporting...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Oct 18, 2011

Agent Orange revelations raise Futenma stakes

On Sept. 26, Nago City Council became the first municipality on Okinawa to adopt an official resolution calling for the governments of Japan and the United States to conduct an investigation into the spraying and storage of Agent Orange on the island.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Oct 18, 2011

Bureaucrat housing perks draw fire

As The Government Scrambles To Find Funds To Rebuild The Disaster-hit Tohoku Region, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda Hinted Monday The Government May Cancel A ¥10.5 Billion Project To Construct A State-owned Housing Complex For Civil Servants In Asaka, Saitama Prefecture, Amid An Opposition Uproar.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Oct 16, 2011

Average Joe could be collateral damage in war against yakuza

The war against the yakuza was raised a notch higher at the start of the month, but not everyone is happy about it.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Oct 16, 2011

The rich are getting out while the getting is good

Japan's wealthy folks are taking their money, and their bodies, to safer havens.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 15, 2011

The joy of taiko and cultural exchange

The booming noise coming up from the basement of the British School in Shibuya Ward, Tokyo, is a more visceral version of the magic flute: It's just impossible to resist its charm. You follow the deep, thumping beat down a flight of stairs and find a shouting, whooping little devil leading a group of...
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Oct 14, 2011

Where have all the gyaru gone?

When model Nozomi Sasaki stepped out onto the catwalk at last month's Tokyo Girls Collection (TGC) fashion event, a wave of sighs rippled through the 30,000 mostly young girls in attendance. Sasaki is one of the most popular models in Japan right now, and her presence was essential at this year's fest,...
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Oct 12, 2011

Nuclear fears reawaken mass anger

Compared with the West, and recently the Middle East, which has been swept by civil uprisings, Japan is not commonly known for having large-scale demonstrations or violent antigovernment protests.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 9, 2011

Television's skewed version of poverty

The Occupy Wall Street demonstrations currently taking place in New York continue to garner more and more attention from the American media, which mostly ignored the movement when it began several weeks ago. Now everybody in America who reads a newspaper or watches TV news understands that the protesters...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 8, 2011

Love and loathing of racial preferments Down Under

In 2009, in two articles published in the Herald Sun and the Herald and Weekly Times, columnist Andrew Bolt wrote that many light-skinned — that is, those who did not look Aboriginal — Australians had chosen to identify themselves as indigenous in order to gain material or professional advantage....
JAPAN / Media / Japan Pulse
Oct 5, 2011

Can anything stop the AKB48 mutations?

The many-limbed J-pop monster they call AKB48 is growing in more ways than one.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Oct 4, 2011

World Heritage listing has its price

News that Iwate Prefecture's historic Hiraizumi area and the Ogasawara Islands would be added to UNESCO's World Heritage List last June lifted the spirits of residents in the Tohoku region after the March 11 quake-tsunami trauma.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Oct 2, 2011

Bikes keep the wheels of progress rolling

With the onslaught of super typhoon No. 15 on Sept. 21-22, for the second time in a little over six months Tokyo's public transport network was snarled by a natural disaster. Several hundreds of thousands of hapless commuters found themselves stranded for hours as kitaku nanmin ("refugees" unable to...
JAPAN
Sep 30, 2011

Seoul urged to nix sex slave monument

Seoul KYODO
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Sep 27, 2011

A compact guide to guidebooks on Japan

Despite the Internet revolution and resultant websites and blogs offering information about every conceivable aspect of any country you'd care to name, many people make sure a copy of their favorite guidebook is in their $500 suitcase or $5 backpack before boarding a plane.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / LIGHT GIST
Sep 27, 2011

No-nos for Noda: Japan's top 10 most useless PMs

On Sept. 2, Yoshihiko Noda was appointed the 95th prime minister of Japan, the sixth man (and they have all been men) to hold the job in five years. To mark this occasion and offer lessons to the new Democratic Party of Japan chief on how not to lead the country, the Community Page asked 10 writers to...

Longform

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