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COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jul 9, 2000

Taking better care of business

The 37th annual Japan-United States Business Conference is being held this week at the Hotel Okura. Top business executives from the two nations who comprise separate, compatible organizations are spending three days discussing important issues that concern commerce between the two most important economies...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 9, 2000

The decade that was, and always will be

SAINT-REMY-DE-PROVENCE, France — The full-page ad gracing the back of last week's Village Voice hit me like a heavy pointy object. "HOT SUMMER TOURS," the headline blared. As a U.S. citizen residing in the city of New York, I enjoy the golden opportunity to see '70s band Steely Dan perform at the romantically...
MORE SPORTS
Jul 8, 2000

Murata aiming high in Champagne Rugby

"I'd like to help our team get promoted to the top division next season," Japan international rugby player Wataru Murata said contentedly Wednesday in Tokyo after completing his first season with French League side Aviron Bayonnais in the so-called Champagne Rugby.
EDITORIALS
Jul 8, 2000

Chechen war, Round 3

A series of suicide bombings marks the resumption of Russia's war in Chechnya. Although President Vladimir Putin declared victory in the conflict earlier this year, the battle has merely shifted fronts. Russia is now engaged in a dogged guerrilla war that bears the hallmarks of the Afghan insurgency...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 8, 2000

Taiwan wary of Chen's willingness to talk

TAIPEI -- The honeymoon is over for Taiwan's new president, Chen Shui-bian. Just over a month after taking office, the man hailed as the champion of the island's independence movement has been branded a heretic by critics within his own party. Analysts in Taipei believe his willingness to pander to pressure...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 8, 2000

Pakistan: managing a nuclear economy

ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan's military leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who remains under U.S.-led Western pressure to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, also faces another challenge: that of reforming his country's battered economy.
BUSINESS
Jul 7, 2000

Telecom novice ready to alter NTT structure if panel says so

The Posts and Telecommunications Ministry in autumn will commission an advisory council to study the best possible structure for Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp., as well as the possibility of revising the NTT law, said the newly appointed posts and telecommunications minister.
JAPAN
Jul 7, 2000

1932 essays recall patriotism of nisei

When 31-year-old Californian Joyce Hirohata was having difficulty writing her high school valedictory speech, her father handed her a book published by her grandfather, Paul Tsunegoro Hirohata.
JAPAN
Jul 6, 2000

Mori seeks a 'reborn Japan'

A day after the launch of his new Cabinet, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori stressed his determination Wednesday to create a "reborn Japan" by improving the economy and promoting the development of information technology.
COMMUNITY
Jul 6, 2000

Young women take to life at sea

It's common knowledge that a large proportion of Japanese traveling abroad these days are young single women. They usually have decent-paying jobs, live rent-free with their parents and spend their salaries as they please. Well aware of this phenomenon, the travel industry has geared some advertisements...
EDITORIALS
Jul 5, 2000

New Cabinet must earn its mandate

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori reorganized his Cabinet on Tuesday. It continues the tripartite ruling alliance of the Liberal Democratic Party, New Komeito and the Conservative Party, even though each party lost seats in the June 25 Lower House election. This new Cabinet is officially referred to as the...
LIFE / Travel
Jul 5, 2000

The Plain of Jars: A place of war and death

PHONSAVAN, Laos -- It should be hard to go missing on the Plain of Jars. But hundreds have.
EDITORIALS
Jul 4, 2000

A step toward financial stability

The Financial Agency, which was launched Saturday in a major move to integrate the operating and planning roles of financial policymaking bodies, started actual operations on Monday. The new financial-watchdog body combines the Financial Supervisory Agency and the Finance Ministry's Financial Planning...
BUSINESS
Jul 4, 2000

Japan refuses to give specifics on reform to U.S.

In a fresh sign of its foot-dragging on deregulatory and other economic-reform efforts, Japan has rebutted a U.S. proposal to compile and submit a new joint progress report on investment issues to their top leaders later this month.
COMMENTARY
Jul 4, 2000

Japan is financially and morally bankrupt

Japan faces the danger of moral bankruptcy. It is difficult to rebuild a morally bankrupt nation, although it is possible to save a financially bankrupt nation with a package of drastic policy measures that could impose economic hardship on the public.
EDITORIALS
Jul 3, 2000

Mr. Mugabe's choice

Zimbabwe is beginning a new era. Last week's elections mark an end to the unchallenged rule of President Robert Mugabe. The president now must make a historic choice. He can either be remembered as the man who led his country into independence or he can aspire to be the man who did that and led his country...
JAPAN
Jul 3, 2000

Japan looks to cleaner sources of energy

Tokai disaster prompts nation to take a new look at alternative power Staff writer
JAPAN
Jul 2, 2000

Ex-lawmaker Utsunomiya dies at 93

Tokuma Utsunomiya, a former Diet member and advocate of disarmament, died of pneumonia Saturday morning at a hospital in Sagamihara, Kanagawa Prefecture, his family said. He was 93.
COMMUNITY
Jul 2, 2000

Noh master calling U.K. college alumni

There was some initial confusion when Naohiko Umewaka requested help in finding graduates of Royal Holloway. What was he talking about? The only Holloway known to this Londoner is the district north of the River Thames best known for the prison of the same name. Now here was a story! Japan's best known...
JAPAN
Jul 2, 2000

Measles up sharply among adults

The number of adults suffering from measles has risen sharply in recent months, with a Tokyo hospital reporting about 20 such cases in the last two months, according to officials at the Health and Welfare Ministry.
CULTURE / Music
Jul 2, 2000

High art from cold metal: Brass music matures at last

There is something powerfully appealing about an ensemble of brass players. Brilliant trumpets and trombones, mellow horns and tubas -- when they are beautifully played, the sound, the strength and the artistry of the playing is quite compelling.
COMMUNITY
Jul 2, 2000

Lovers of blood and sand form Tauro Tokyo Club

There are a huge variety of clubs in Japan. Table-tennis clubs and social dance clubs, hostess clubs and clubs where you can polish up your karaoke. But there is only one club devoted to the art of bullfighting.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 30, 2000

Radical Hindus wrecking India's tolerant secularism

NEW DELHI -- The new millennium has been terribly cruel to Christians in India. Fanatical Hindu organizations -- which are wings of the country's ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) -- have unleashed a reign of terror on the second-largest minority group after the Muslims. Murder and mayhem and...
JAPAN
Jun 30, 2000

Key cultist sentenced to die for role in two sarin attacks

Senior Aum Shinrikyo follower Yasuo Hayashi was sentenced to death Thursday for releasing nerve gas on a Tokyo subway train in March 1995 and for his role in the deadly June 1994 sarin attack in Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture.
COMMUNITY
Jun 29, 2000

Fresh ideas keep old traditions alive

"A hundred people must have told me it was impossible," said Sarah Cummings as we sipped sake in the stylish Kurabu restaurant in the village of Obuse.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 29, 2000

A Chinese teenager's dream of a better life ends in tragedy in the back of a truck

CHANGLE, Fujian -- Smartly dressed in a Calvin Klein T-shirt, jeans and white trainers, the teenager props up a motorbike in Changle, a city in the southern Chinese province of Fujian. His hair flopping over sunglasses, he flashes a shy grin at the camera. Jin Xicai hardly resembles the stereotype refugee,...
JAPAN
Jun 28, 2000

Top farm bureaucrat pleads not guilty to bribery

An elite farm ministry bureaucrat pleaded not guilty Tuesday to helping an agricultural cooperative in Kagawa Prefecture secure farm subsidies in exchange for entertainment worth 2.9 million yen.
SOCCER / World cup
Jun 28, 2000

Venables likes France's chances at Euro 2000

BRUSSELS -- Former England manager Terry Venables is tipping France to win the European Championship. Venables, who led England to the semifinals of Euro 96 in England, has been impressed by the improvement in the French team since it won the World Cup two years ago.

Longform

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