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COMMENTARY / World
Nov 3, 2006

Affront to Korean identity

BANGKOK -- By distorting the historical record between Korea and China, Beijing has created a crisis that has united the ruling party in Seoul and its sometimes disloyal opposition.
EDITORIALS
Nov 3, 2006

Resumption of tough negotiations

North Korea's agreement to return to the six-party talks on its nuclear-weapons program is good news. At least, there will be no new nuclear-weapons tests by Pyongyang for the time being. But optimism is not warranted. The difficult task of getting North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and related...
BUSINESS
Nov 3, 2006

FSA soliciting bids for Ashikaga bank

The Financial Services Agency began soliciting bids Thursday for the sale of state-owned Ashikaga Bank Ltd., publishing the conditions that buyers must satisfy to purchase the Tochigi Prefecture-based bank.
COMMENTARY
Nov 2, 2006

Curbing the Iranian empire

LONDON -- The preemptive strike doctrine -- that is, hitting the other party quickly when it looks as though it is going to hit you -- is as old as mankind itself. History is strewed with accounts of daring raids to catch the threatening enemy unprepared, from the wars of Greek mythology to modern times....
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Nov 1, 2006

Bear-faced cheek and jumbo bugs

One of the best perks I get from the wild woods is honey. Mr. Matsuki, our forester up here at the Afan Woodland Trust in Nagano Prefecture, is a beekeeper who prefers to encourage wild Japanese bees -- whose honey has a very delicate taste -- rather than raise foreign varieties better-known for their...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 29, 2006

Is the sun setting on the future of Japan?

SHUTTING OUT THE SUN: How Japan Created Its Own Lost Generation, by Michael Zielenziger. New York: Doubleday, 2006, 352 pp., $24.95 (cloth). The strength of this book lies in its sensitive and poignant portraits of hikikomori, Japan's recluses. Their stories of withdrawal are etched with pain and anomie....
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 29, 2006

Children's welfare in the doghouse

This past week the nation was shocked by the news of yet another small child who died at the hands of abusive and negligent adults.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 26, 2006

A change in gender for new political series

For more than two decades, Yasumasa Morimura, one of Japan's most internationally celebrated artists, has inserted his own face into iconic paintings by van Gogh, Manet and Rembrandt, as well as portraits of stars such as Marilyn Monroe and Vivian Leigh. With his elaborate, hilarious and often gender-bending...
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Oct 23, 2006

Room for microcredit in the notorious 'gray zone'?

For sci-fi lovers, the twilight zone is a scary place, the stuff of bad dreams. But for borrowers of consumer loans in Japan, it is the "gray zone" that constitutes the nightmare.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 23, 2006

The global plight of the girl combat soldier

NEW YORK -- Legal proceedings against Thomas Lubanga Dyilo now taking place before the new International Criminal Court offer some hope that a serious kind of crime will be effectively punished and deterred.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Oct 21, 2006

Debbie Kopinski

Celebrating its 50th anniversary, Ikebana International is holding its Ninth World Convention in Tokyo Oct. 27-30. Some 850 ikebana enthusiasts are participating.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 19, 2006

Playing with energy

Though on the surface it's easy to think everyone else has got it sorted out, things are not always what they seem. From time to time we all feel like a blip in the universe, trapped by things beyond our control -- whether unbending social powers, finicky laws, monetary limitations or annoying office...
EDITORIALS
Oct 19, 2006

Nuclear logic fails

Liberal Democratic Party policy chief Shoichi Nakagawa's suggestion at the beginning of this week that Japan needs to discuss whether it should arm itself with nuclear weapons is both careless and thoughtless at a time when the international community is making efforts to eliminate nuclear weapons from...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 19, 2006

European politics swing right

BRUSSELS -- Europe is in danger of seeing its extreme-right parties move into the mainstream. The message has changed. Anti-Semitism has metamorphosed into "Islamophobia" since 9/11, finding a popular resonance with those bearing the consequences of the war on terror. Islamophobia has become the prejudice...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 15, 2006

The first steps to rapprochement

JAPAN'S FOREIGN POLICY 1945-2003: The Quest for a Proactive Policy, by Kazuhiko Togo. Leiden: Brill Academic, 2005, 484 pp., $49 (paper). Kazuhiko Togo, one of Japan's leading strategic thinkers about foreign policy, wrote an article in the June issue of Far Eastern Economic Review calling for a moratorium...
COMMENTARY
Oct 14, 2006

Get tough with Pyongyang

HONOLULU -- Virtually every statement issued in response to North Korea's apparent first-ever nuclear-weapons test has included an admonition (or plea) for Pyongyang to return to the moribund six-party talks. But, are all parties prepared to take "yes" for an answer?
EDITORIALS
Oct 14, 2006

The darkness in Russia

Three recent killings in Russia raise troubling questions about the rule of law in that country. The three incidents are not linked but that is not to say they are random killings: Investigations of the murders will probe the same murky corners where political and economic influence intersect. The realization...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / THE SECOND ROOM
Oct 13, 2006

Psychedelic radar 10.13

Raja Ram's Stash Bag Tour 2006
EDITORIALS
Oct 11, 2006

Fear of another arms race

North Korea's announcement that it went ahead with a nuclear-weapons test Monday appeared timed to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's summit with South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun -- a day after his summit with Chinese President Hu Jintao.
BUSINESS
Oct 11, 2006

Businesses welcome Chinese thaw but remain cautious

The business community greeted Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Sunday summit in Beijing with Chinese President Hu Jintao, billed as a fence-mending effort by the two countries, with a sigh of relief.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Oct 9, 2006

Abe must speed up reforms, forge new model of growth

Newly-elected Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the nation's first leader born after World War II, has launched his Cabinet with veteran lawmakers capable of taking the lead -- rather than relying on the bureaucracy -- in the implementation of fresh policy initiatives. Keidanren fully supports Abe's determination...
COMMENTARY
Oct 7, 2006

Pyongyang's nuclear threat

HONOLULU -- North Korea announced on Tuesday that it "will, in the future, conduct a nuclear-weapons test," promising that it will be done under conditions where "safety is firmly guaranteed." While Pyongyang did not say when this test would occur, it made it clear that it felt compelled to take such...
EDITORIALS
Oct 6, 2006

Crying for attention, again

North Korea has announced it will conduct a nuclear-weapons test, without saying when. In February 2005, the North announced it possessed nuclear weapons, but this is the first time the country has publicized its intent to carry out a test.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 5, 2006

"Kazunori Kumagai: Resolution of My Tap"

BunkamuraSaturday Oct. 9, 6:18 p.m.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 5, 2006

A differing view on the war on terror

NEW YORK -- Recent revelations in The New York Times on the fight against terrorism and the war on Iraq present a differing view on the problem worth pondering about. According to classified information in the National Intelligence Estimate leaked to the Times, the American invasion and occupation of...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Oct 3, 2006

Divorce and tenant troubles

Divorce Reader SJ and his wife were married nearly 40 years ago in the United States. At that time, SJ agreed to list her as half-owner of our home. For various reasons, the couple now do not get along and are on the way to separation or divorce.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 1, 2006

May the least undesirable candidate win

WARSAW -- The late British Prime Minister Harold Wilson used to quip that "a week is a long time in politics." In the 30 or so weeks between now and the next French presidential election, any prediction made today could be reversed, and reversed again, before the vote.

Longform

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