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EDITORIALS
Feb 9, 2005

Good sportsmanship in Saitama

Japan's national soccer team plays the North Korean team today in a qualifying match for the Asian World Cup in Saitama City, just north of Tokyo. Given the continued tense relations between the two countries, the Japanese government is calling on Japanese supporters to avoid quarreling with supporters...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 9, 2005

Howard Baker will be missed

The image of ambassadors has changed greatly over the years. Until the mid-20th century, ambassadors were said to be "dwellers among the clouds" -- a Japanese phrase for the nobility. This metaphor showed what ordinary people thought of nobles. To the commoners busy with their daily work, the privileged...
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2005

Japan closer to lifting ban on U.S. beef

Japan moved a step closer to partially lifting a ban on U.S. beef imports after a government panel on Tuesday accepted U.S. assurances that a specific grade of U.S. beef would be free of mad cow disease.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2005

Household spending up 0.5% in '04

Monthly household spending averaged 304,203 yen in 2004, up a real 0.5 percent from the previous year, the government said Tuesday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Feb 9, 2005

Feminist life actually: singing in the pain of Japan

The word "feminist" has been stripped of the luster it had back in the 1970s, and few Japanese women are more aware of this than Michiko Kasahara. Widely regarded as one of Japan's leading feminist curators, Kasahara was responsible for groundbreaking exhibitions such as "Gender: Beyond Memory" at the...
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2005

Kirin set to dive into quasi-beer fray

Kirin Brewery Co. announced Tuesday it will release a malt-free beerlike alcoholic beverage on April 6, joining its biggest rival Asahi Breweries Ltd. in the so-called third-beer market pioneered by Sapporo Breweries Ltd. and Suntory Ltd.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2005

Justsystem defies ruling

Justsystem Corp. filed an appeal Tuesday with the Tokyo High Court, seeking to repeal an order to stop producing and selling its Ichitaro word-processing and Hanako graphics software on grounds that they have a function that infringes on a Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. patent.
BUSINESS
Feb 9, 2005

UFJ to protect depositors from fraud

Bank said Tuesday it plans to compensate customers whose money is withdrawn with counterfeit cash cards through no fault of their own.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 9, 2005

Chimeras and shadows

In the service of the imagination of photographer Yuki Onodera, familiar objects become dreamily unsettled by memories and movements and, by degrees, disengage to the point of of unreality.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 9, 2005

Lost metallic art revived at last

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COMMUNITY
Feb 9, 2005

Prostitution, human trafficking thrive as a lucrative immorality

ISLAMABAD -- The countries making up the South Asia region support about one-quarter of the planet's population, with a large number of people unemployed and living below the poverty line. This socioeconomic situation has helped increase social crimes especially like human trafficking, especially of...
SOCCER / J. League
Feb 8, 2005

Sandro handed suspended sentence

The Tokyo District Court on Monday sentenced Brazilian forward Sandro Cardoso Dos Santos of J. League team JEF United Ichihara-Chiba to 10 months in prison, suspended for three years, for sexually assaulting a woman at his home in May 2004.
SOCCER / World cup
Feb 8, 2005

Zico's plan puzzles Nakamura

Japan midfielder Shunsuke Nakamura has questioned the timing of national team coach Zico's decision to leave him out of the starting lineup for Wednesday's crunch World Cup qualifier against North Korea.
EDITORIALS
Feb 8, 2005

Concern over the first vCJD case

Japan last week confirmed its first case of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), the human version of mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). The disease is said to spread through the consumption of beef products from cows infected with BSE. In Britain, which reported a high...
COMMENTARY
Feb 8, 2005

LDP missing the big picture

How to privatize postal services is the biggest issue in the regular Diet session. The government plans to introduce a privatization package in mid-March, and Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has vowed to "get it through the current session at all costs." But with many members of the Liberal Democratic...
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Vodafone K.K. inserts Morrow as president as subscribers fall

The Japanese unit of global mobile-phone carrier Vodafone Group Plc. said Monday that Bill Morrow, head of the group's British operations, will replace Shiro Tsuda as president just two months after Tsuda assumed the position.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Nippon Shinpan, UFJ to adopt JCB credit card software

Nippon Shinpan Co. and UFJ Card Co. said Monday they have agreed to adopt JCB's computer software to control key functions in their credit card operations, possibly by the end of fiscal 2008.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Nippon Life picks Okamoto as president to succeed Uno

Nippon Life Insurance Co. said Monday that Kunie Okamoto, a senior managing director, will be promoted to succeed Ikuo Uno as president beginning April 1.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Okuda to complete Nippon Keidanren chairman term

Toyota Motor Corp. Chairman Hiroshi Okuda clarified on Monday that he intends to complete his second two-year term as head of the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren), which expires in May 2006.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Takeda to buy U.S. biotech company

Japan's largest drug maker, Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., said Monday it will acquire Syrrx Inc., a privately held California biotechnology company working on treatments for cancer and diabetes.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Feb 8, 2005

Do you still respect NHK?

Etsuko Stelljes Data entry, 33 NHK tried to change facts about the story of comfort women, so now I can't trust their documentaries. Even though the director quit his job to take responsibility, he was hired again as an adviser. I hate that.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Feb 8, 2005

Wills, holistic dentistry and cash

More on wills "To quote your column from some time ago," writes MJ, " 'Japanese inheritance law states that at the death of one spouse, half the estate goes to the remaining partner and half to the children of the marriage.'
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Flat TVs seen taking 86% of market in '09

Sales of plasma-display panel and liquid crystal display televisions are likely to grow about 3.5-fold from 2004 to 9.5 million units in Japan, accounting for 86 percent of overall TV sales in 2009, an industry association said Monday.
BUSINESS
Feb 8, 2005

Matsushita, Hitachi join on plasma panels

Electronics giants Matsushita and Hitachi said Monday they have agreed to tie up in the plasma display panel business amid diving prices and intensifying competition.

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?