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COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Jul 9, 2000

Taking better care of business

The 37th annual Japan-United States Business Conference is being held this week at the Hotel Okura. Top business executives from the two nations who comprise separate, compatible organizations are spending three days discussing important issues that concern commerce between the two most important economies...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 9, 2000

Opposition gives flawed economic message

According to some Western pundits, the recent Lower House election was going to be a big yawn, with little debate over real issues. In fact, from the start there was a very real debate between the coalition, which argued that the economy still needed pump priming, and the opposition, which claimed that...
JAPAN
Jul 8, 2000

Kono talks on North Korea, the G8 summit and Russia

The government "will not simply stay idle" in its relations with North Korea, Foreign Minister Yohei Kono said Thursday, noting that Tokyo is ready to reopen stalled normalization talks with Pyongyang following its recent moves to open up to the outside world.
JAPAN
Jul 7, 2000

Defense chief does about-face on time limit for Marine base

Newly appointed Defense Agency chief Kazuo Torashima has had to retract a remark that it would be difficult to put a 15-year time limit on the use of a new airport for the U.S. Marines to be built in Nago, Okinawa Prefecture.
LIFE / Travel
Jul 5, 2000

Get back to the garden, the perfect summer oasis

There's a reggae-loving bar owner in Fukuoka who loathes the stereotype that reggae is "summer music." Truth is, though, his business does extremely well during summer. It seems that atmosphere-building is still an essential part of the seasons in Japan.
SOCCER / World cup
Jul 4, 2000

Japanese, Koreans study cohosting at Euro 2000

ROTTERDAM, Netherlands -- Senior officials from both the Japanese and Korean World Cup organizing committees said Saturday they expected to learn many things from the cohosted Euro 2000 Soccer Championship, but emphasized that the 2002 World Cup was a different kettle of fish with its own attendant problems....
COMMUNITY
Jul 2, 2000

Noh master calling U.K. college alumni

There was some initial confusion when Naohiko Umewaka requested help in finding graduates of Royal Holloway. What was he talking about? The only Holloway known to this Londoner is the district north of the River Thames best known for the prison of the same name. Now here was a story! Japan's best known...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / GETTING THINGS DONE
Jul 2, 2000

Remembrance

"Sensei." Along with "sayonara," that is one of the first words most of us learn when we come to Japan. Though the image has been somewhat tarnished in these recent years of school disorders and juvenile delinquency, traditionally the word sensei, or teacher, has been one of the most honorific terms...
EDITORIALS
Jun 30, 2000

Germany says 'no nukes'

The agreement reached earlier this month between the German government and major electric-power companies to phase out that country's commercial nuclear program in about 30 years came as a fresh reminder of the global shift away from nuclear energy production. The "irreversible" landmark agreement is...
JAPAN
Jun 29, 2000

Red Army fugitive returned for trial

Red Army Faction fugitive Yoshimi Tanaka arrived Wednesday in Japan to face trial for his role in a Japan Airlines jetliner hijacking 30 years ago, following his arrest in Thailand by Japanese police the previous night.
ENVIRONMENT
Jun 28, 2000

Nature's playground welcomes kids of all ages

Located on low hills (67 meters above sea level) in Yokohama's Minami Ward, the Yokohama Children's Botanic Garden opened to the public in 1979 (the Year of the Child) with an area of 4 hectares. Since then, many of the trees have matured, creating a woodland atmosphere.
CULTURE / Books
Jun 27, 2000

Your most valuable briefing paper

DOING BUSINESS WITH THE NEW JAPAN, by James Day Hodgson, Yoshihiro Sano and John L. Graham. Rowman & Littlefield, 2000, 230 pp., $27.95 (cloth). Do we really need another book about doing business in Japan? Probably not -- and not even if this is a "new Japan" or a new era in international capitalism....
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 27, 2000

Art, enlightenment and empire

THE IDEALS OF THE EAST, by Okakura Kakuzo. Tokyo: ICG Muse Inc., 2000, 250 pp., 1,300 yen.
JAPAN
Jun 26, 2000

Rain-aided coalition cruises toward victory

Amid lower-than-expected voter turnout, the Liberal Democratic Party-led ruling triumvirate appeared to have secured at least a simple majority in the Lower House in the general election held Sunday, exit polls show.
JAPAN
Jun 26, 2000

Coalition wins a stable majority

The Liberal Democratic Party-led ruling triumvirate suffered a major setback but managed to secure a comfortable majority in the Lower House in Sunday's general election.
COMMENTARY
Jun 26, 2000

English is not the answer

Earlier this year, the Forum on 21st Century Japan, a private panel to the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, proposed a national debate on whether English should be used in Japan as a second official language. That proposal has added fuel to the long-standing discussions on English education in this...
JAPAN / ELECTION 2000: VOX POPULI
Jun 24, 2000

Voters to blame for deadbeats, nepotism in Diet, says Totten

If citizens want a better Japan, they need to turn out for Sunday's election and vote against the old-school lawmakers and those who aim to inherit a parent's seat as if it were a birthright, according to American businessman Bill Totten.
SOCCER / J. League
Jun 24, 2000

J. League second-stage race looks wide open

After the Yokohama F. Marinos dramatically won the first stage a month ago, the J. League Division One second stage is set to get underway Saturday.
BUSINESS
Jun 22, 2000

Good management heeds environment, not culture: scholars

The economic performances of Japan and the United States have contrasted sharply over the past two decades, with Japan's boom in the 1980s and the strong U.S. recovery in the 1990s exposing differences in management styles and the changing nature of models of success.
BUSINESS
Jun 20, 2000

Official cool to NTT's call to revise law

A top posts and telecommunications regulator on Monday brushed aside a call by the head of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. to revise the law governing NTT's operations to resolve a row between Japan and the United States.
JAPAN
Jun 20, 2000

Pyonyang understood message on ties: envoy

North Korea understands that relations with South Korea will not improve unless Pyongyang strives to strengthen ties with Japan and the United States, an envoy of South Korean President Kim Dae Jung told Foreign Minister Yohei Kono on Monday.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 20, 2000

New rules, old political games

Japanese go to the polls June 25 in the nation's second general election that combines single-seat constituencies and proportional representation.
JAPAN
Jun 20, 2000

Expat candidates enter the political fray

As campaigning for Sunday's Lower House election heats up, two candidates are lucky to have a guaranteed point of interest — one comes from Finland, the other from China.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Jun 19, 2000

Sure, Japanese rice is expensive -- you're paying for all the chemicals

Don't expect the government to look out for your best interests when it comes to chemicals.
COMMENTARY
Jun 16, 2000

Voter turnout key to election

Official campaigning is under way for the June 25 general election. This will be the first Japanese general election to be held in three years and eight months, following the last poll in October 1996. The new Lower House, whose term will run to 2004, will be the center of national politics as Japan...
COMMENTARY
Jun 15, 2000

Mori's slip ill-chosen but well-intended

Debate continues over Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori's statement last month that Japan is "a country of gods with the Emperor at its center."

Longform

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