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EDITORIALS
May 19, 2009

Keeping an eye on prosecution

As the lay judge law goes into effect on May 21, another important judiciary reform goes into effect. Under a law revision, committees for the inquest of prosecution, in which ordinary citizens participate, will have more sway than before over decisions made by public prosecutors.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 19, 2009

IC you: bugging the alien

When the Japanese government first issued alien registration cards (aka gaijin cards) in 1952, it had one basic aim in mind: to track "foreigners" (at that time, mostly Korean and Taiwanese stripped of Japanese colonial citizenship) who decided to stay in postwar Japan.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
May 19, 2009

Weight of Imperial world on Princess Masako

Observers often liken Crown Princess Masako to Britain's Princess Diana. They both embody the fairy tale gone tragically wrong — women outside the royal circle wooed by the heir to the throne, only to end up clashing with the establishment and surrounded by controversy and speculation that has made...
EDITORIALS
May 18, 2009

Another outrage in Myanmar

It was always a safe bet that the military junta that rules Myanmar was going to come up with some way to extend the house arrest of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and leader of the prodemocracy forces in her country. The absurd charges leveled against her last week is proof yet again...
JAPAN
May 18, 2009

Japan slow to realize it wasn't immune to swine flu

OSAKA — In Kobe and Osaka, as well as in Tokyo, shocked officials dealing with the outbreak of swine flu had more or less the same reaction Sunday as Kansai Okura High School principal Takaharu Miyanomae.
COMMENTARY / World
May 18, 2009

Pope discovers his voice in a pilgrimage of learning

HONG KONG — Pope Benedict XVI's leaving the home comforts of the Vatican for the political and religious mine field called the Holy Land proved to be his own difficult pilgrimage in which a learned, but aloof, theologian discovered in Palestinian pain and suffering his own authentic cry for peace in...
CULTURE / Books
May 17, 2009

Casting from which 'Audition'?

Ten years after the release of Takashi Miike's film of the novel, Ryu Murakami's "Audition (Odishon)" has finally been translated into English. Aoyama, a fortysomething documentary maker, decides it is about time he remarried. His beautiful, talented and understanding wife Ryoko has been dead for seven...
Japan Times
JAPAN
May 17, 2009

Hatoyama elected head of DPJ

Democratic Party of Japan chose Yukio Hatoyama as its new president Saturday by a relatively large margin over Katsuya Okada, who was the more popular candidate among the public in opinion polls.
COMMENTARY
May 17, 2009

California dream-makers in the driver's seat

LOS ANGELES — Sometimes it's not that easy living in Los Angeles. Despite splendid weather, sprawling beaches and gorgeous mountain ranges — not to mention the well-tanned Hollywood stars — you face the unrelenting, withering scorn of smug colleagues long established in New York and Washington....
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
May 17, 2009

Japan's cocktail king leaves the world reeling from his alco-antics

Pretty soon there is going to be a backlash against the Japanese for their habit of heading overseas and outshining the locals in some of their proudest vocations.
Japan Times
JAPAN / MIXED MATCHES
May 16, 2009

Diplomacy in love, life and work

Aiko Tanaka, 27, met Olegs Orlovs, 27, for the first time when she visited his home country, Latvia, as a tourist with her family in 2002. Olegs was her tour guide.
JAPAN
May 16, 2009

Lack of fireworks as DPJ rivals' debate ends in a tie

Yukio Hatoyama and Katsuya Okada, the two candidates in the Democratic Party of Japan's presidential election Saturday, both stuck to the party line in a public debate in which the only way they seemed to differentiate themselves from each other was in their choice of ties.
JAPAN
May 16, 2009

Bill would allow organ harvesting from children with parental OK

As pressure mounts to revise the controversial organ transplant law, lawmakers across party lines submitted a fresh bill Friday to the Diet on top of the three bills that are already being deliberated.
EDITORIALS
May 15, 2009

Truths about malpractice

Doctors have been acquitted in one malpractice trial after another. In August 2008 an obstetrician in Fukushima Prefecture was found innocent in the death of a woman from blood loss during a Caesarean operation. In November that year a Kyorin University doctor who did not realize a cotton-candy stick...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 15, 2009

Deerhunter

Bradford Cox, frontman for Atlanta, Georgia's, self-styled "ambient punks" Deerhunter, tends to attract attention.
CULTURE / Art / ART BRIEF
May 15, 2009

Toshimitsu Baba Exhibition

Base Gallery, Tokoyo
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 15, 2009

'State of Play'

There's a scene in "State of Play" where an unkempt, hard-nosed veteran reporter (Russell Crowe) — you know, the type who drink their whiskey straight, out of a paper cup — meets his new colleague, a younger, perkier journalist (Rachel McAdams) who bangs out gossipy blogs for their newspaper's digital...
JAPAN
May 15, 2009

Ozawa to still play key role, rivals vow

Democratic Party of Japan Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama and deputy chief Katsuya Okada, the two candidates running in Saturday's DPJ presidential race, said Thursday resigning President Ichiro Ozawa will still serve in a key post.
Reader Mail
May 14, 2009

Fulfillment despite eccentricity

Regarding Michael Hoffman's April 26 article, "Nagai Kafu: a literary loner": Kafu at the time was basically eccentric. Many people frown on this trait, yet each one of us has our share of eccentricities. They are what make each of us unique. I truly admire men and women whom many may view as self-absorbed,...

Longform

Eme-Ima Kitchen is one of over 10,000 kodomo shokudō in Japan. A term first used in 2012 to describe makeshift eateries offering free or cheap meals to disadvantaged kids, it now refers to a diverse range of individuals, groups and organizations working to provide not only food but a sense of belonging to both children and adults.
Japan’s ‘children’s cafeterias’ are booming — but is that a good thing?