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JAPAN
Apr 3, 2006

Aso: Troops to stay put in Iraq until stability restored

Japanese troops may stay in southern Iraq until a degree of political stability is restored in the country, Foreign Minister Taro Aso said Sunday, denying media reports they might pull out by May.
JAPAN
Apr 3, 2006

Aso says China a threat; shrine overtures rebuffed

Foreign Minister Taro Aso on Sunday called China a military threat and Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe rebuffed conciliatory gestures by Beijing over Yasukuni Shrine in comments likely to heighten tensions between the two nations.
JAPAN
Apr 3, 2006

Bullet trains to permit scooters

Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) and West Japan Railway Co. are considering accepting mobility scooters for disabled people on new bullet train cars, sources said Sunday.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 3, 2006

Challenges, opportunities for the Japan-U.S. alliance

HONOLULU -- As its 55th birthday approaches, the Japan-U.S. alliance faces new challenges and new opportunities. Ironically, new security threats -- and new demands for cooperation -- provide the best opportunities to revitalize the alliance. The bilateral security relationship is in better shape than...
JAPAN
Apr 3, 2006

Ozawa eager to fight for top DPJ post

Ichiro Ozawa, former vice president of the Democratic Party of Japan, says he is eager to run in the party's presidential election this Friday.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Apr 3, 2006

Things to watch as BOJ restores interest rates

The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Japan's biggest banking group, raised the rates it offers on time deposits with a maturity of one year or over on March 20. The increase varies according to the size of the deposit and the length of maturity. The annual rate for a five-year deposit under 3 million yen,...
COMMENTARY
Apr 3, 2006

Protectionism has returned to Europe

LONDON -- The big idea was that Europe would do away with economic nationalism, sweep away frontiers and stand as a shining example to the rest of the world of free trade and open markets. That was the dream. The reality is turning out rather differently.
SOCCER
Apr 2, 2006

FC Tokyo holds Marinos to draw

YOKOHAMA -- FC Tokyo's Tatsuya Masushima ruined Yokohama F. Marinos' chance to reclaim the J. League top spot when he crashed in an equalizer deep into stoppage time at Nissan Stadium on Saturday.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Apr 2, 2006

How it all began for Baseball Bullet-In 30 years ago

Believe it or not, it was 30 years ago this week when the "Baseball Bullet-In" first appeared in the pages of The Japan Times. I was 27 years old and still a student at Sophia University on Tokyo when the first column ran on April 4, 1976.
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Apr 2, 2006

Isiah has to go for Knicks to be fixed

NEW YORK -- When I'm not being accused by first-grade readers of being excessively negative about the 19-52 Knicks -- who would have a hard time against the dead or alive 1952 Knicks -- and charged with having something personal against Isiah Thomas, Larry Brown and Stephon Marbury, I'm dared to holster...
JAPAN
Apr 2, 2006

Doctor association elects new leader

The largest doctors' group in Japan chose Yoshihito Karasawa on Saturday as its new president to replace Haruo Uematsu, who has kept his distance from the administration of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 2, 2006

Engaging with China beats other option

LOS ANGELES -- Is China only playing nice with the United States now in order to buy time and consolidate its power so that it has the capacity to hurt it later? You'd be surprised how many Americans think this -- or maybe you wouldn't!
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 2, 2006

It's a different war through the eyes of civilians

LEAVES FROM AN AUTUMN OF EMERGENCIES: Selections From the Wartime Diaries of Ordinary Japanese, edited by Samuel Hideo Yamashita. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005, 332 pp., with b/w photos, $26 (paper). There are a number of reasons for keeping diaries -- to preserve time, to account for it,...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Apr 2, 2006

Tireless emcee comes up with "Mino Monta no Sashinomi" on Nihon TV and more

Apparently, being listed in the Guinness Book of Records isn't enough for tireless emcee Monta Mino. On Monday, at midnight, he launches yet another series with himself as host. That adds up to a whopping 10 programs a week for the 61-year-old presenter, who claims to only need three hours of sleep a...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 2, 2006

Accepting apologies is not so easy

JAPANESE APOLOGIES FOR WORLD WAR II: A Rhetorical Study, by Jane W. Yamazaki. London: Routledge, 2005, 256 pp., £65 (cloth). POLITICS, MEMORY AND PUBLIC OPINION: The History Textbook Controversy and Japanese Society, by Sven Saaler, Munich: Deutsches Institut fur Japanstudien, 2005, 202 pp., 28 euro...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 2, 2006

Buying U.S. out of Okinawa started a habit that is hard to kick

The bombshell that former Foreign Ministry official Bunroku Yoshino dropped last month hasn't had the explosive effect one might expect. Yoshino was in charge of the ministry's American Bureau at the time the United States handed Okinawa back to Japan in 1972, and in an exclusive interview in the Feb....
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Apr 2, 2006

Rice rats and romance on the 'River of Nine Dragons'

The rusty boat farts, coughs and chugs slowly along the narrow river channel, a skinny boy perched on its prow shouting directions back to the captain (who does almost as much farting and coughing as his geriatric craft). There's the slop and slosh of oily water round my boots. Three rice rats are busy...
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Apr 2, 2006

Murata, Doi come up big for BayStars

Shuichi Murata homered twice and drove in six runs and Yoshihiro Doi held a power-laden lineup to one run over seven sharp innings, leading the Yokohama BayStars to a 9-1 rout of the Yomiuri Giants in the Central League on Saturday.
EDITORIALS
Apr 2, 2006

The opposition regroups

Mr. Seiji Maehara's decision to step down as chief of the Democratic Party of Japan, and to take responsibility for a recent e-mail fiasco in the Diet, came suddenly but too late. He leaves the spotlighted position without living up to party members' hopes that he would energize their goals. His resignation...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Apr 2, 2006

A torso squeaks -- but what does it say about the media?

OK, this is confession time. Even though I have lived in Japan for decades, there is something that still absolutely drives me up the wall -- so high up the wall, in fact, that I feel like Spiderman on a Shinjuku skyscraper.
Japan Times
Features
Apr 2, 2006

Taking tanka to a new and timeless plane

Machi Tawara made a spectacular debut as a tanka poet at the age of 25 in 1987, and since then the Osaka-born artist has devoted her life to condensing her world into those neat, rhythmic but not rhyming, 31-syllable compositions.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Apr 1, 2006

Giants rout BayStars on Opening Day

Opening Day must be Koji Uehara's least favorite day of the year, but things change.
EDITORIALS
Apr 1, 2006

Israel chooses to go forward

Party emerged victorious in national elections held this week in Israel. The win was a victory for interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who took the helm of government -- and the newly formed party -- after Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was felled by a stroke. The celebrations will be short-lived as Mr....

Longform

Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell