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BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 3, 2015

Abe property boom spurs REITs to favor stock sales

Real estate investment trusts are raising more funds from shares and avoiding a volatile bond market, as investors bet "Abenomics" will boost property prices.
Japan Times
JAPAN / GENERATIONAL CHANGE
Mar 1, 2015

Educator brings fresh learning opportunities to Tohoku youths

For Kumi Imamura, 35, an award-winning educator, setting up a place of learning for children in the disaster-hit Tohoku region was the natural next step in her career.
Japan Times
JAPAN / AT A GLANCE
Mar 1, 2015

From bars and cherry blossoms to Totoro, Kichijoji has it all

Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Feb 28, 2015

Omotenashi — Japanese hospitality?

As the Tokyo 2020 Bid Committee's appointed "Cool Tokyo" ambassador, multilingual television journalist Christel Takigawa set media buzzing worldwide with her Sept. 7, 2013, speech to the International Olympic Committee in Buenos Aires in which she made great play of the word "motenashi" by attaching...
Reader Mail
Feb 28, 2015

Too tired to care who is standing

Having returned to Japan nearly five years ago — after living in the United States for 15 years — I was wondering why the Japanese generally lacked courtesy on the train when it came to yielding their seats to elders, pregnant women or people with small children. In the U.S., gentlemen yielded seats...
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Feb 26, 2015

NASA investigating helmet water leak after spacewalk

Two U.S. astronauts finished a 6½-hour spacewalk on Wednesday to prepare parking spots for new commercial space taxis, and then discovered water had leaked into a spacesuit helmet, a problem that led to the near-drowning of another astronaut in 2013, officials said.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Feb 25, 2015

Obama vetoes Republican attempt to force Keystone pipeline approval

President Barack Obama issued his third veto Tuesday to reject legislation that would allow construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, escalating a battle over the project with Republicans in Congress.
Japan Times
WORLD
Feb 25, 2015

Worried about Russia, Lithuania plans military conscription

Lithuania plans to restart military conscription, which it ended in 2008, to address growing concerns about Russian assertiveness in the Baltic region, President Dalia Grybauskaite said on Tuesday.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE PERSISTENT VEGETARIAN
Feb 24, 2015

Indian fare adds spice to vegetarian dining

While it's easy to trust that almost every Indian restaurant will have plenty for a vegetarian to eat — and you can often ask for an all-vegetarian meal by request — it's an incomparable delight when the menu is entirely made up of vegetarian choices.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 24, 2015

Nujabes’ friends to pay tribute to the soulful hip-hop producer on the fifth anniversary of his death

When a traffic accident on Feb. 26, 2010, claimed the life of independent hip-hop auteur Jun Seba, who recorded and DJed under the name Nujabes, even some of his closest collaborators didn't find out until a few weeks later. The Japanese rapper Shingo Annen, better known by his professional name Shing02,...
Japan Times
WORLD
Feb 24, 2015

Peacekeepers should make greater use of drone imagery, says U.N. panel

A United Nations panel assessing the future technological needs of peacekeeping missions has recommended dramatically expanding the use of unmanned surveillance drones in U.N. military operations, the head of the panel said on Monday.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Feb 23, 2015

Pusses galore: Cats dominate the pet industry

Though cats are cheaper than dogs to acquire, you may end up spending more money on them.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 20, 2015

Japan's constitutional millstone

If there is one factor that could help the Abe administration overcome the constitutional millstone against modernizing Japan's military defense, it would be Obama administration support. Japan is the only power that can block China from gaining ascendancy in the region.
JAPAN
Feb 19, 2015

Foreign advisers fear for loss of nuclear regulator's independence

International advisers to the Nuclear Regulation Authority are worried that a mandatory review of its performance could lead to a loss of independence for the body, created in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Feb 18, 2015

Abe's JA reforms no salve for core problems, experts say

Takashi Tomita, who heads an agricultural cooperative in Echizen, Fukui Prefecture, is considered a ray of hope for a farming sector on the brink of collapse.
BUSINESS
Feb 18, 2015

Britain approves world's largest offshore wind farm

Britain's energy ministry has approved the Dogger Bank Creyke Beck offshore wind project, the world's biggest offshore wind park, it said in a statement on Tuesday.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 16, 2015

Breaking Europe's climate-change stalemate

If Europe is to remain an environmental leader as well as a center of innovation, it will have to embrace realistic solutions that can deliver environmental benefits without sacrificing economic development.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 15, 2015

Sony still faces tough hurdles despite CFO's successes

Despite Kenichiro Yoshida's successes as Sony CFO, the company is still facing tough hurdles.
ASIA PACIFIC
Feb 15, 2015

'Nut rage' prompts South Korea to consider law against 'high-handed' conduct

Resentment has mounted so much in South Korea against what has come to be known as "gabjil," high-handedness by the rich and powerful, that parliamentarians are proposing legislation to punish some of the worst abuses.
Japan Times
JAPAN / NATIONAL SPOTLIGHT
Feb 15, 2015

LGBT students may be ready to come out, but are Japan's schools ready to accept them?

When university student Osamu Inoue, 19, came out openly in high school two years ago and admitted he was gay, he had hoped that at least his school would have adopted a more positive attitude toward sexual minorities.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Feb 14, 2015

Love thy neighbor? Chinese nationals who call Japan home

Like tempestuous lovers, China and Japan have sparred for centuries but have remained interdependent in each other's economy, politics, culture, language and arts.
WORLD / Science & Health
Feb 13, 2015

U.N. climate deal to rely on persuasion, not coercion

A U.N. deal due this year to fight global warming is set to avoid tough penalties for nations that fail to keep their promises, relying instead on persuasion and peer pressure, delegates at climate talks said Thursday.

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