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COMMENTARY
Jun 29, 1999

Japan presses Asia's agenda

In a strong warning to North Korea, the Group of Eight leaders who met in Cologne, Germany, earlier this month said in a declaration that they "are deeply concerned about recent missile flight tests and developments in missile proliferation, such as actions by North Korea."
JAPAN
Jun 29, 1999

FRC outlines control criteria for weak banks

The government will consider exerting control over banks that have received public funds if their capital adequacy ratios dip below half of the minimum requirements, the Financial Reconstruction Commission said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Jun 29, 1999

Diet begins deliberating flag and anthem bill

Diet debate on a government-proposed bill to recognize the Hinomaru as the national flag and "Kimigayo" as the national anthem began Tuesday with Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi telling a Lower House plenary session that legal recognition would give the Japanese people the correct understanding of the national...
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Jun 29, 1999

The Super Furry Animals engage in 'Guerrilla' warfare

In 1996, I began visiting another planet when an album called "Fuzzy Logic," by an unknown Welsh band called Super Furry Animals, opened up a wormhole in my mind which enabled me to cross into a weird mangalike dimension whenever I switched on my stereo. Oh, and also I got a name for this column.
JAPAN
Jun 29, 1999

Telecom Realignment: Rival carriers prepare to combat Goliath

Second in a five-part series on reorganizing the domestic telecommunications industry
CULTURE / Books
Jun 29, 1999

American haiku now holds its own

THE HAIKU ANTHOLOGY, by Cor van den Heuvel. W. W. Norton, pp. 363, $27.50. Cor van den Heuvel is the most important anthologist of haiku composed in English in North America. He has published three collections, all simply called "The Haiku Anthology" and all through prominent commercial houses: Doubleday,...
CULTURE / Books
Jun 29, 1999

A century after emancipation, buraku issue still haunts Japan

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE BURAKU ISSUE: Questions and Answers, by Suehiro Kitaguchi. Translation and introduction by Alastair McLauchlan. Richmond, Surrey: Japan Library, 1999, pp. 211, 35 British pounds (cloth). This is the translation of a number of important articles by Suehiro Kitaguchi in which he...
CULTURE / Books
Jun 29, 1999

Meet Dr. Doom, Asia's most interesting analyst

RIDING THE MILLENNIAL STORM: Marc Faber's Path to Profit in the New Financial Markets, by Nury Vittachi. John Wiley & Sons, 1998, pp. 241, $29.95 (cloth). Great combination. Hyperkinetic Hong Kong scribe Nury Vittachi, author of 10 books and countless newspaper and magazine columns, and Marc Faber,...
EDITORIALS
Jun 28, 1999

Staring at the abyss in Northern Ireland

Though more than a year has passed since politicians in Northern Ireland signed the historic Good Friday peace accord, the document has remained a dead letter due to a dispute over the disarmament of the Irish Republican Army. Now the agreement is unraveling, posing a real danger that dialogue will once...
JAPAN
Jun 28, 1999

New Komeito role weighed as LDP, Liberals huddle

The Liberal Democratic Party on Monday began moving aggressively to expand its coalition government to include New Komeito — and secure a majority in the Diet's Upper House.
JAPAN
Jun 28, 1999

Toyota mulls expanded U.S. presence

Fujio Cho, the new president of Toyota Motor Corp., said Monday that the possibility is high that Toyota will establish a new auto assembly base in North America to cope with increasing demand in the United States.
EDITORIALS
Jun 26, 1999

Cracks in the wall of silence

Physicians in this country seem so confident of their group strength that they can afford to ignore public opinion. So, at least, say critics of the powerful medical establishment in the wake of this week's failure by a subcommittee of the government's medical reform council to agree on a proposal to...
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Farm chief cool to reduced bank deposit protection

Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Shoichi Nakagawa voiced caution Friday about the government's plan to abolish full deposit protection at the end of March 2001.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Osaka all smiles for sports meeting

OSAKA — Overseas visitors to a major international conference here in October will be greeted by young women shoving drinks into their hands and smiling old male bureaucrats distributing promotional literature.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Study group set for constitutional debates in 2000

The House of Representatives is set to launch a study group in January 2000 to debate issues related to the Constitution, informed sources said Friday.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Obuchi expected to ask New Komeito to join bloc

In a move heralding the formation of a tripartite coalition, Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi and New Komeito leader Takenori Kanzaki are expected to hold talks before the second opposition party's July 24 convention.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Latest dioxin study reveals large drop in '98 emissions

Total dioxin emissions in Japan in 1998 were reduced to less than half of 1997 levels, but they were still far larger than in other developed countries, the Environment Agency said Friday.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Ishihara announces plan for Silicon Valley office

Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara announced Friday he will set up an office in Silicon Valley in the United States to offer information about Tokyo's small and midsize enterprises to investors and venture capitals.
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

High Court rejects copper trader's appeal

The Tokyo High Court on Friday dismissed the appeal of former Sumitomo Corp. chief copper trader Yasuo Hamanaka, upholding a lower court ruling in March 1998 that sentenced him to eight years in prison for fraud and forgery.
CULTURE / Music / PLAY BUTTON
Jun 25, 1999

J rockers want free Tibet, wherever that is

"Tibet . . . hmm . . . it's a foreign country, I know that," mused one young man.
CULTURE / Film
Jun 25, 1999

Lost opportunity of the disco daze

If there were ever a high-water mark of hedonism, it would have to have been located at some New York or L.A. disco in the late '70s. In this pre-AIDS, post-Pill era of guilt-free sex, drug use was widespread and largely tolerated, gay culture was coming out of the closet and sexual mores were loosening...
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Koike's payoff man at Yamaichi avoids prison

The Tokyo District Court sentenced a former managing director of the bankrupt Yamaichi Securities Co. to a suspended 10-month prison term Thursday for giving undue profits to "sokaiya" corporate extortionist Ryuichi Koike and compensating the racketeer for stock losses.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Author says Nanjing death toll politically inflated

Akira Suzuki, prize-winning author of the controversial book "Nanjing: How the World Was Fed Facts and Fakes," reasserted at a press conference Thursday that the Nanjing Massacre death toll of 300,000 cited by the Chinese government lacks credibility from a historical standpoint.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Recession not sole cause of suicide

All Daisuke Tajima could think about was ending it all. One day the 49-year-old salaried worker walked out of his office in a city in northern Japan, and for weeks his family had no clue as to his whereabouts.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Toy makers join hands on e-commerce venture

Heads of the nation's top four toy makers announced Thursday that they will launch a joint venture with Softbank Corp. to sell toys over the Internet beginning in November.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

U.N. ambassador presses for UNSC role in future conflicts

Although Japan supported Western efforts to end the atrocities in Kosovo, the government wants the U.N. Security Council to authorize future actions, according to Yukio Satoh, Japan's ambassador to the United Nations.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Ministry wants flag, anthem promoted in textbooks

Social studies textbooks must help instill respect for the Hinomaru flag and the "Kimigayo" de facto national anthem among the nation's children, according to the results of last year's textbook screening released Thursday by the Education Ministry.
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

LDP group demands revised SDF law, powers

A group of ruling Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers asked the government Thursday to revise the Self-Defense Force Law to expand areas the SDF can guard to beyond airspace, and to draft bills for better handling of high-level contingencies within Japan.
EDITORIALS
Jun 23, 1999

The North Korean enigma

The two Koreas are talking again. Sort of. Fourteen months after talks between the two governments broke down, diplomats met in Beijing Tuesday to resume discussion about the fate of the 1 million families separated by partition after World War II and by the Korean War. The meeting was delayed one day...
EDITORIALS
Jun 23, 1999

A debt to the United Nations

The agreement that ended the military campaign against Yugoslavia highlights the critical role played by the United Nations in resolving international disputes. NATO made war against Belgrade; the U.N. made the peace. Hopefully, the U.S. Congress will recognize that simple truth this week, as the Senate...

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone.
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan