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JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Gangster nabbed for gun-running

Police arrested a member of the Inagawa-kai underworld syndicate and raided 10 locations, including a Yokohama office controlled by the mob Friday, on suspicion the gang was attempting to smuggle guns and explosives into Japan, police sources said.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Livedoor overvalued publisher for gains: sources

The Livedoor Co. group deliberately overassessed the value of a publisher owned by an investment union it controlled to increase the gains made from share sales, which were then passed on to it through investor dividends, sources said Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Core CPI rises 0.1% for second straight month

In yet another sign that deflation may be dead, the nationwide core consumer price index, excluding volatile perishables, grew 0.1 percent in December for the second straight month, the government said in a preliminary report Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Three-prong North Korea talks set for Feb. 4

Japan and North Korea will begin the first of three-track normalization talks on Feb. 4 in Beijing, Foreign Minister Taro Aso said Friday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Livedoor nemesis now rescuer

Livedoor Co. on Friday asked Fuji Television Network Inc. to support its efforts to recover during the two firms' first executive-level talks since prosecutors raided Livedoor's offices on Jan. 16 over alleged Securities and Exchange Law violations, Fuji TV President Koichi Murakami said.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Imperial Couple to tour S.E. Asia

Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko will make a weeklong visit to Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand in June, the government said Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Mom held in fire that killed daughter

A 29-year-old woman was arrested Friday on suspicion of setting her apartment in Koto Ward, Tokyo, on fire, killing her 4-year-old daughter, police officials said.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Hotelier beats checks, drops disabled access

Toyoko Inn Co. admitted Friday that some of its business hotels in Yokohama and other areas removed mandatory parking facilities for the disabled after authorities certified them as barrier-free.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Support for Cabinet falls to 52.9%

The approval rate for Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Cabinet stood at 52.9 percent in January, down 4.2 percentage points from the previous month, a Kyodo News poll of 1,007 people showed Friday.
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

U.S. Democrats urge Japan to halt nuclear fuel plan

WASHINGTON (Kyodo) Six U.S. Democrats have urged Japan to suspend its plan to begin a test operation to extract plutonium at a nuclear-waste reprocessing facility in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, Democratic congressional sources said Thursday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Metro interpreters join fight against TB

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government has recently begun offering interpreters for Chinese, Korean, Filipino and Thai residents who have come down with tuberculosis.
SOCCER / J. League
Jan 28, 2006

Japan has nine on slate

Japan will play nine games in the runup to the World Cup finals in Germany kicking off on June 9, the Japan Football Association announced Friday.
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

Fewer women atop ladder in '05

The number of female corporate leaders in Japan fell for the first time in 25 years in 2005 to 67,299, down 604 from the previous year, according to a survey by a private credit research company.
EDITORIALS
Jan 28, 2006

No place for pension evasion

At a time when people's trust in the nation's pension systems is declining, some enterprises, especially small ones, are behaving in a manner that will weaken the reliability of social security. They deliberately choose not to join the corporate employees' pension system (kosei nenkin) while the number...
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

Bargain-hunters circling Livedoor group in search of value

What's in a name?
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

Net brokerages post record profits

Japan's top five online securities companies posted record operating revenues and net profits for the April-December period of 2005 on a jump in trading commissions, particularly from individual investors, according to the brokerages' financial results, all of which had been released by Friday.
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

Koizumi wants stronger securities commission

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi urged government officials and ruling coalition lawmakers Friday to discuss ways to give the Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission more teeth.
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

Annual retail sales record first increase in nine years

Retail sales rose 1.1 percent in 2005 to 129.52 trillion yen, chalking up their first year-on-year rise in nine years, due largely to soaring fuel prices and robust clothing sales, the government said Friday.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 28, 2006

Professor faked enzyme test: Todai panel

A University of Tokyo investigative panel said Friday that results from 12 experiments on human enzymes conducted by one of its academic teams have not been reproduced so far, suggesting a biochemistry engineering professor may have fabricated results published in scientific papers on the research.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jan 28, 2006

Yuko Nishimura

"I was lucky, in a way," Yuko Nishimura said. "I did most of the things I wanted. I like what I am doing now."
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jan 28, 2006

No single recipe for facing challenges of globalization

T here are multiple ways for companies to stay competitive in a globalized world, and even firms in what are often perceived as sunset industries have the potential for success, scholars and business executives said at a recent symposium in Tokyo.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jan 28, 2006

The rah-rah radish, part II

On Shiraishi Island, the radish rah-rah starts in December, when you see "o-baa-chans" pushing wheelbarrows full of daikon. The esteemed radish is wheeled around -- entire radish families are given rides. In December and January, they are pulled out of gardens and transported to houses. If you look closely,...

Longform

A store clerk tries to cool things down in front of their shop by spraying a hose.
Is extreme weather changing the way Japan shops?