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Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 22, 2002

The star-spangled chawan

With lines of silver breaking through a black laquer surface, the tenmoku pottery of Koji Kamada conjures images of the unknown universe. Visitors to an exhibition at Akasaka Yu Gallery celebrating Kamada's 30-year career have a rare opportunity to see masterpieces made by Japan's leading tenmoku potter....
BUSINESS
May 22, 2002

Toshiba creates slim, flexible LCD

Toshiba Corp. said Tuesday it has developed what it claims is the world's first large flexible liquid crystal display, paving the way for showing images on curved screens and foldable LCDs.
BUSINESS / ON THE FRONT LINE
May 22, 2002

Watch for consequences of yen's surge

The yen has suddenly begun surging on the world currency market, hitting a five-month high of just over 125 to the dollar.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
May 22, 2002

From the edges of 'reality'

At the most basic level of classification, most paintings can be assigned to one of two broad but fairly clear-cut categories: representational or abstract. This is to say that what appears on the canvas has generally evolved either from people, places or things found in the real world; or from ideas...
BUSINESS
May 21, 2002

Nonlife insurers hit hard by Sept. 11, stock losses

Hit by hefty share price losses and insurance payouts following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, four of the nation's nine largest nonlife insurers on Monday reported net losses for the 2001 business year.
COMMENTARY / World
May 21, 2002

Time to put Sino-Japanese rivalry aside

Observing the prolonged negotiations over the fate of five North Korean asylum seekers seized by Chinese police from the Japanese Consulate General in Shenyang and the widespread criticism in Japan over the way that Japanese diplomats handled the matter, it seems vital to decouple the humanitarian issue...
EDITORIALS
May 20, 2002

Regrets and resolutions

The Foreign Ministry's latest annual report reads partly like a litany of resolutions. That is only to be expected given the series of incidents and scandals that have hit the foreign service over the past year or so. Naturally, the blue book, as the report is commonly known, calls for a string of steps...
COMMENTARY
May 20, 2002

Musharraf must bring growth, security

ISLAMABAD -- The suicide bomber in Karachi, Pakistan's southern port city, who killed 11 French citizens in broad daylight, could not have found a more opportune moment to strike against the government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf. The general has spent the past few months trying to convince skeptics of...
JAPAN / WHALE WATCHING
May 19, 2002

IWC talks crucial, U.S. official says

The international whaling meeting that opens Monday is the most important in 15 years, and its outcome is as hard to predict as it is significant, according to the head of the U.S. delegation.
ENVIRONMENT
May 19, 2002

What the label doesn't say

Scandals about deception in product labeling have been in the news of late, with both the expiry dates and the origins of dairy and meat products called into question. While not as big a news item, the labeling standards for whale meat take deception to further, murkier depths -- and to dangerous ones....
COMMENTARY
May 19, 2002

Koizumi must act to end his state of siege

I cannot help but suspect that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and the members of his Cabinet feel beset with troubles both at home and abroad as the current session of the Diet enters the homestretch.
ENVIRONMENT
May 19, 2002

Thar she blew!

TAIJI, Wakayama Pref. -- From the lead boat it was difficult to see the spray rising from the waters off Tomyo Point. The onshore breeze dispersed it before it could rise too high and the choppy waters forced the rowers to concentrate on their task. Nonetheless, the sign was there.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
May 19, 2002

Where the adventure begins

Wine complements all sorts of moods. At times, it is convivial. We share a bottle around the table, and our group of friends become merrier, the conversation seasoned with laughter. Yet wine can also nourish quiet contemplation. Sip a glass alone or with one other person (a beloved, perhaps), and then...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
May 19, 2002

Repent of Western ways to see the light

A BURDEN OF FLOWERS, by Natsuki Ikezawa. Kodansha International, 2001, 239 pp., 2,400 yen (cloth) A story of two Japanese siblings' rejection of Western values, one eloquent on the dangers of being "too Cartesian in your thinking, too tied up in Western rationalism," is hardly an obvious candidate for...
ENVIRONMENT
May 19, 2002

How deep does our knowledge go?

The group of animals we call cetaceans represent but two-thirds of the orders of "whales" that have ever existed.
BUSINESS
May 18, 2002

Yamaha group net balance in red

Yamaha Corp. said Friday its group net balance fell into the red in fiscal 2001 due chiefly to appraisal losses on its securities holdings.
BUSINESS
May 18, 2002

WTO notified over steel tariffs

Japan on Friday notified the World Trade Organization of its plan to slap 100 percent retaliatory tariffs on U.S. steel imports, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said.
JAPAN
May 18, 2002

Cows born in spring '96 face inspection

The farm ministry will inspect all cows born between March and April 1996 for symptoms of mad cow disease, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Tsutomu Takebe said Friday.
COMMENTARY
May 17, 2002

Japan at its inconsistent worst

Japan's overheated reaction to the May 8 North Korean refugee incident at the Japanese consulate-general in Shenyang, northeast China, is worrying.
BUSINESS
May 17, 2002

Corporate failures rack up 1.48 trillion yen in liabilities

Liabilities left in the wake of corporate failures surged to 1.48 trillion yen in April, marking a year-on-year rise of 21.8 percent, credit research institute Teikoku Databank said Thursday.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language
May 17, 2002

Dinosaurs walking the earth once more

A full-length model of the skeletal structure of the seismosaurus will make its world debut at "The Greatest Dinosaur Expo 2002" to be held this summer at Makuhari Messe in Chiba.
BUSINESS
May 17, 2002

U.S.-Japan steel talks going down to the wire

Tokyo will tell the World Trade Organization on Friday that it intends to levy retaliatory tariffs on U.S. steel imports worth $4.88 million, according to an official of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
BUSINESS
May 17, 2002

Japan dismisses credit ratings

Yasuo Fukuda, the top government spokesman, said Thursday that credit-rating agencies such as Moody's Investors Service Inc. have underestimated Japan's economic strength.
EDITORIALS
May 17, 2002

Cold War in cold storage

American President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin have agreed to a historic arms control treaty that will make drastic cuts in the two countries' nuclear arsenals. The agreement should be applauded, but it is long overdue: Domestic politics in both countries have conspired against...
EDITORIALS
May 16, 2002

Lessons from the Shenyang incident

Japan and China have been locked in a diplomatic row over an incident May 8 in which Chinese police guards seized and removed five North Korean asylum seekers from the compound of the Japanese Consulate General in Shenyang, northeastern China. On Wednesday, however, it appeared that concerns over the...

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Pedestrians commute through Shibuya Station in central Tokyo, an area that is almost never devoid of people.
As the rest of Japan shrinks, Tokyo grows