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JAPAN
Dec 5, 2001

Nago likely to offer reef as site for new airport

The city of Nago in Okinawa Prefecture is likely to choose a reef off the island as the site for a military-civilian airport that will accommodate the heliport functions of the U.S. Futenma Air Station in the prefecture, the city mayor said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Dec 2, 2001

Crown Princess Masako gives birth to a girl

The Crown Princess gave birth to a girl Saturday afternoon, the first baby in her 8 1/2-year marriage to the Crown Prince.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Dec 2, 2001

Restaurant J: Food that gladdens the heart of man

Restaurant J has been open for more than a year, so there's absolutely no reason for the Food File to wait any longer to bestow its seal of approval. But we're still reluctant to give it the unconditional thumbs-up it so richly deserves. Why so? It's the same old story: We're always loath to spread the...
COMMENTARY
Nov 19, 2001

Japan needs a new foreign minister

In a recent speech before the United Nations General Assembly, former Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa proposed that an international conference be held urgently to discuss ways of bringing peace to Afghanistan and rebuilding the war-torn country. Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka, not the 82-year-old Miyazawa,...
BUSINESS
Nov 12, 2001

Independent body needed for financial inspections: FSA chief

Japan should create an independent body to inspect various types of financial institutions including those run by agriculture and labor bodies, Financial Services Minister Hakuo Yanagisawa said Sunday.
COMMENTARY
Nov 2, 2001

Removing blinkers on trade

LONDON -- The tragic events of Sept. 11 have exacerbated the economic position of every country. New stimulus measures have been instituted in the United States and interest rates have been cut elsewhere. But these are not enough to put growth back on track. An expansion in world trade would bring major...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Nov 1, 2001

These dreams are made of . . . what?

Ever had a sleepless night before an exam, cramming in the things you didn't learn in time? Even after 40 hours without sleep, it is still possible to disgorge crammed information. But remember those facts a week later? Forget it.
JAPAN
Oct 16, 2001

Asylum-seekers face tough time in Japan

Gol Ahmad Bahador does not want to go back to Afghanistan.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 8, 2001

Transnistria: relic of a bygone era

TIRASPOL, Moldova -- Think of the end of the Soviet Union as the Big Bang of recent politics. The successor states are the new planets -- large or small, and subject to varying amounts of gravitational pull from Russia. And then there are the asteroids, in this case composed of breakaway republics, autonomous...
JAPAN
Oct 2, 2001

Civil servant union finds it is missing 50 million yen

Around 50 million yen withdrawn in 1998 by a firm affiliated with a prefectural and municipal employee union is missing, sources familiar with the case said Monday.
BUSINESS
Sep 13, 2001

Government, LDP at odds over bailouts of ailing firms

The government and tripartite ruling coalition are involved in a tug of war over a proposal to create a commission to help troubled but viable companies rebuild, with coalition lawmakers criticizing the government's noncommittal stance.
JAPAN
Aug 28, 2001

Kinki postal bureau searched over vote-rigging scandal

OSAKA -- Police on Monday raided the Kinki Postal Administration Office following the arrest of its head official Sunday in connection with a vote-rigging scandal.
JAPAN / 50 YEARS SINCE SAN FRANCISCO
Aug 23, 2001

Japan's foreign policy still retains U.S. trappings

First of a six-part series looking back on 50 years of Japanese-U.S. relations since the 1951 signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the bilateral security treaty. By JUNKO TAKAHASHI Staff writer Nobuo Matsunaga was a young diplomat in Paris when Japan signed the San Francisco Peace Treaty, which...
BUSINESS
Aug 20, 2001

Obstacles to decentralization must embrace independence

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi won big gains for his Liberal Democratic Party in the Upper House election and has been re-elected uncontested to a new two-year term as LDP chief. But the tasks ahead of him are mounting, and one of the biggest is the decentralization of administrative power.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 12, 2001

Don't let it happen to you

You might think that athlete's foot is a man's problem and the bunion, or hallux valgus, is a woman's problem. You'd be wrong. There are many female patients who knowingly or unknowingly carry the fungal infection on their feet, while some male bunion patients live with a painfully deformed toe.
JAPAN
Aug 9, 2001

ODA, public works cuts face LDP opposition

The Foreign Ministry and some LDP policymakers expressed opposition Wednesday to a government panel's decision to cut Official Development Assistance in the fiscal 2002 budget by 10 percent from the initial fiscal 2001 budget.
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2001

Inoue is re-elected as president of Upper House

The House of Councilors re-elected Yutaka Inoue as its president and Shoji Motooka as vice president Tuesday during the first Diet session since last month's nationwide election.
JAPAN
Aug 6, 2001

Yasukuni visit 'will certainly be made,' says Yamasaki

Taku Yamasaki, secretary general of the governing Liberal Democratic Party, said Sunday that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi will definitely pay a visit to Yasukuni Shrine, where Class A war criminals are honored, despite strong opposition from neighboring Asian countries.
BUSINESS
Aug 4, 2001

Food firms facing polarized market

The nation's food companies are facing increasingly polarized consumption trends, and any firm that fails to meet the needs of such a market faces future downgrading, Moody's Investors Service Inc. said Friday.
EDITORIALS
Jul 30, 2001

Mr. Kim goes to Moscow

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is on his way for two-day talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. A special train carrying him and his entourage arrived in the Russian Far East Thursday en route to Moscow. This is the first Moscow trip by a North Korean head of state since Mr. Kim's father, the...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 26, 2001

Legalization: The drug war's best weapon

LONDON -- In Spain, Italy, Portugal, and Switzerland it is practically impossible to get arrested for buying or using "soft drugs." In the Netherlands, users may buy up to five grams of cannabis or hashish for private use at 1,500 licensed "coffee shops," and they are opening two drive-through outlets...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jul 26, 2001

The king is a beast, but the queen is a democrat

Imagine a place where all the females give birth at the same time, where grandmothers nurse their daughters' children and baby-sit for them, and where all children are raised in a protective nursery. Where females join together in defending the community against dangerous strangers and those of the same...
CULTURE / Film
Jul 25, 2001

Something for everyone under the big blue sea

Dykkerne Rating: * * 1/2 Director: Ake Sandgren Running time: 91 minutes Language: DanishNow showing This is my second week in a row writing on a film from Scandinavia, so I'm suffering somewhat from Big Blonde People Overload. Especially since the latest involves apple-cheeked, sturdy-boned youngsters...
CULTURE / Books
Jul 22, 2001

Thanks to 'doken kokka,' are Japan's best decades behind it?

THE EMPTINESS OF JAPANESE AFFLUENCE, by Gavan McCormack. Armonk, NY: ME Sharpe, 2001 (2nd edition), 311 pp., $27.95 (paperback). What went wrong? A decade ago few would have predicted the sustained malaise that has gripped Japan since the early 1990s.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 4, 2001

Wahid warms Australian-Indonesian ties

SYDNEY -- Staying or going, Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid can number at least one advance during his troubled term in Jakarta. He has earned the awe, even respect, of often-critical neighbor Australia.
COMMENTARY
Jun 30, 2001

Time for a strategic dialogue

HONOLULU -- Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi will have a lot to talk about with U.S. President George W. Bush when the two meet for the first time at Camp David this weekend. High on the agenda should be the initiation of a strategic dialogue aimed at redefining the U.S.-Japan security relationship....
JAPAN
Jun 25, 2001

Japan to give $100 million to AIDS fund

The government will pay about $100 million for a fund proposed by United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan to promote the international crusade against AIDS, government sources said Sunday.

Longform

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