Search - 2002

 
 
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 3, 2004

Discrimination keeps Chinese tourists at bay

Japan's neglect of its tourism potential could be called a sidelight of its overall self-image. On the international stage, Japan sees itself as culturally impenetrable and overpriced. Moreover, the xenophobia that many people accuse it of fostering has become accepted by the citizens as a national trait,...
Japan Times
Features
Oct 3, 2004

Teddy bares all

Long before baseball's Ichiro Suzuki or soccer's Hidetoshi Nakata became stars overseas, in 1987 a 15-year-old boy from Asahikawa in Hokkaido flew to London on his way to taking the ballet world by storm just a few years later.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CABINET INTERVIEW
Oct 3, 2004

Koike vows to sway business sector on carbon tax

Yuriko Koike, reappointed as the environment minister, says Japan needs a carbon tax to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Oct 2, 2004

FTA concessions needed: Nakagawa

Japan may have to make more concessions to push forward free-trade negotiations with Southeast Asian nations, according to Shoichi Nakagawa, minister of economy, trade and industry.
BASEBALL / MLB
Oct 1, 2004

Godzilla hits 29th, 30th HRs; Yanks sweep Twins

NEW YORK -- Hideki Matsui homered in both games of a doubleheader on Wednesday against the Minnesota Twins as the New York Yankees swept the twinbill, 5-3 and 5-4, to move to the verge of clinching their seventh straight AL East title.
BUSINESS
Oct 1, 2004

Pay phones vanishing as mobile use spreads

Pay phones have been disappearing as mobile phone use spreads.
EDITORIALS
Sep 30, 2004

Plug loopholes in political funds law

The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office has indicted former Chief Cabinet Secretary Kenzo Muraoka over a political-donation scandal involving the Liberal Democratic Party's largest faction. This seems to confirm the widespread public suspicion that a number of influential members of the faction...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 29, 2004

Boys be ambitious

Journalists approach Shutoku Mukai warily. As the leading personality of cult group Number Girl, Mukai cultivated an aura of negative charisma. Onstage, he was all contorted painful energy, round geeky glasses slipping down his nose as he spat out lyrics and drew harsh, ranting chords from his guitar....
EDITORIALS
Sep 27, 2004

A greater burden for higher earners

The government's Tax Commission is discussing the fiscal 2005 revision of the tax system. The focus this time is on the decrease or abolition of the fixed reduction for individual income and resident taxes, which was introduced in 1999 as an economic-stimulus measure. Rather than draw the line there,...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 27, 2004

The sky should be the limit for Kashmir

India and Pakistan are still holding on to their own rigid positions. India keeps harping that Kashmir can only be one of a list of subjects to be discussed. Pakistan disagrees and argues that Kashmir is a central issue that has to be tackled first.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Sep 26, 2004

Mourinho's method wins many games, not many friends

LONDON -- Returning from Chelsea's 3-0 Champions League win over Paris Saint-Germain in France last week this correspondent was the last passenger to leave the team's plane. A police officer at Gatwick Airport asked: "Did they win?"
COMMENTARY
Sep 26, 2004

Curtain falls on China's 'strongman' era

HONG KONG -- The decision by 78-year-old former President Jiang Zemin to step down as head of the Chinese Communist Party's Central Military Commission in favor of 61-year-old Hu Jintao, his successor as party and state leader, is a milestone in China's political development, marking as it does the completion...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Sep 25, 2004

New Center for Creative Arts up and running

Anyone passing the South Korean Embassy in Tokyo's Moto Azabu in recent months may well have wondered about the flag reading "RBR -- New Center for Creative Arts" flying from the building opposite. Also the steady flow of visitors -- every age, color, race and creed.
BUSINESS
Sep 23, 2004

Vodafone unveils 3G models for yearend season

Vodafone K.K. on Wednesday unveiled seven cell phone models for the yearend shopping season.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 22, 2004

It's a thin line between love and hate

Monster Rating: * * * * (out of 5) Director: Patty Jenkins Running time: 109 minutes Language: English Opens Sept. 25 [See Japan Times movie listings] Aileen Wuornos is often tagged the first female serial killer and the first U.S. woman to receive the death penalty neither is true,...
EDITORIALS
Sep 22, 2004

Landmark power transfer in China

The resignation of Mr. Jiang Zemin as chairman of China's Central Military Commission (CMC), the country's top military post, completes the transfer of power from Mr. Jiang to his successor, Mr. Hu Jintao. The handover is a landmark in modern Chinese politics, but its political impact is unclear. Mr....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 22, 2004

Stop usif you'veheard thisone before

The Quiet American Rating: * * * 1/2 (out of 5) Director: Philip Noyce Running time: 101 minutes Language: English Now showing [See Japan Times movie listings] When Graham Greene penned his novel "The Quiet American" in 1954, he was set on capturing a particular point in time in late,...
BUSINESS
Sep 22, 2004

Daikyo, UFJ to take IRCJ rehab route

Daikyo Inc. and its main creditor, UFJ Bank, are planning to seek support from the government's Industrial Revitalization Corp. of Japan, possibly this month, to rehabilitate the struggling condominium builder, sources said Tuesday.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2004

Japan's diplomatic might

In late August, Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi visited four Central Asian states to build a new framework of regional dialogue. The creation of the "Central Asia Plus Japan" forum means that Japan is pushing strategic diplomacy in the geopolitically important Silk Road region, surrounded by Russia,...
Japan Times
Features
Sep 19, 2004

Cream-puff heaven is open to all

First it was Chinese dumplings that got the theme park treatment at Ikebukuro Gyoza Stadium in 2002. Then, last year, up popped Ice Cream City. So, what was to be this year's gastronomic addition to the menu of attractions at Namco Namja Town in Sunshine City?
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 19, 2004

Suffering survivor's guilt

PURPLE SUN, by Lawrence McAuliffe. Hinesburg, VT: Upper Access Books, 2003, 233 pp., $12.95 (paper). In this short work, a U.S. Marine named Billy Kern cracks up and deserts his unit to remain behind in Vietnam after the war. Twenty-eight years later, a master sergeant and officer who knew him go back...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 19, 2004

Chechen-Arab connection goes far back

CHICAGO -- As gunmen seized a school full of hostages in southern Russia last week, President Vladimir Putin had held a meeting that might have seemed to some like a distraction.
COMMENTARY
Sep 19, 2004

Removing the thorn from Japan-China ties

HONG KONG -- Last month, when Japanese and Chinese teams faced each other in the Asian Games soccer final in Beijing, Chinese fans booed so loudly that they drowned out the strains of the Japanese national anthem. And when Japan won, the spectators pelted the Japanese players' bus with soda bottles and...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 18, 2004

Uniqlo chain plans to enter U.S. market in 2006

Fast Retailing Co., a casual-clothing store chain known for its Uniqlo brand, will try to enter the U.S. market as early as 2006, company President Genichi Tamatsuka said in a recent interview.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2004

Private universities stage central Tokyo comeback

After relocating some departments to the outskirts of Tokyo to cope with increasing enrollments, private universities are now increasingly returning to the city center to survive amid a declining birthrate.
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2004

Koizumi to get specially heated water via fuel cell

The government said Thursday it will make the world's first purchase of a polymer electrolyte fuel cell to help supply electricity and heated water to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's new residence.

Longform

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