Japan's No. 1 tennis player Kei Nishikori's historic run at the Australian Open won a torrent of publicity for sponsor Fast Retailing Co., attention Sony Corp. and Adidas AG missed by not renewing endorsement deals.
Japan's public broadcaster NHK purchased the rights to air Nishikori's Australian Open match yesterday, boosting the estimated TV audience to 55 million viewers in Japan, after the 22-year-old defeated No. 6 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to win a berth in the quarterfinals. Nishikori lost the match to No. 4 seed Andy Murray, after becoming the first Japanese man in 80 years to reach the $12 million tournament's final eight.
(Bloomberg)
Uniqlo scores in bet Sony, Adidas missed on tennis ace Nishikori
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Fukushima's animals abandoned and left to die
When you stand in the center of Japan's exclusion zone, there is absolute silence. The exclusion zone is the 20-kilometer (12-mile) radius around the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, an area of high radiation contamination.
On March 12, the day after the quake and tsunami hit, 78,000 people were evacuated out of this area, believing they would return within a few days. As such, thousands of people left with their dogs tied up in the backyard, cats in their houses and livestock penned in barns.
Nearly a year later, animal carcasses litter the region.
Cows and pigs starved to death, their bones still in pens. Dogs dropped dead with disease. A cat skull sits on a neighborhood road.
This is perhaps an inevitable outcome to a nuclear emergency, but animal rights activists call it an outrage. (CNN)
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China 0vertakes Japan as world's top coal importer
While China has long been the world's top producer and overall consumer of coal, the country also became the largest importer of the resource last year, overtaking a position held by Japan since at least 1975.
Customs data compiled by the International Energy Agency show that strong domestic demand boosted China's coal imports by 10.8 percent in 2011 to 182.4 million tons. Japan's imports of the fossil fuel dropped by 5.1 percent to 175.2 million tons over the same period due, at least in part, to the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit the country's northeast coast last March.
However, a Reuters poll conducted last month showed that China's coal imports are expected to slow during 2012 as domestic production rises and overall consumption of the fossil fuel begins to plateau, leaving it unclear whether or not China will retain its position in 2012. (china-briefing.com)
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KDDI net profit falls 17%
Japanese telecom operator KDDI said Thursday net profit for the December quarter fell 17 percent on falling income from voice calls but raised its full-year revenue outlook thanks to iPhone 4S sales.
The country's number two telecom firm said its net profit for the fiscal third quarter dropped to 54.2 billion yen ($698 million) from 65.7 billion yen in the same period a year earlier.
Operating profit for the quarter fell 5.4 percent to 117 billion yen from 124 billion yen a year earlier, it said.
But it did say revenue for the three months increased 5.7 percent to 902 billion yen on the back of increased data traffic due to solid demand for smartphones. (AFP)
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Japan prices fall, mild deflation to persist
Japan's core consumer prices fell for the third consecutive month in the year to December, and mild deflation is expected to persist this year as energy prices stabilize and worries about Europe's debt crisis suppress wage growth and economic activity.
Core consumer prices declined an annual 0.1 percent, matching the median estimate, and a narrower measure that excludes both food and energy also fell in a sign that Japan continues to grapple with a strong yen, which pushes down import prices and makes exporters reluctant to raise salaries.
Retail sales fell 1.2 pct in 2011, the first fall in two years, and auto and machinery equipment sales posted record falls in the series, which dates back to 1980. But sales rose an annual 2.5 percent in December, the biggest increase in 16 months. (Reuters)
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Govt failed to keep records of key nuke meetings
Japan's deputy prime minister acknowledged Friday that the government failed to take minutes of 10 meetings last year on the response to the country's disasters and nuclear crisis and called for officials to compile reports on the meetings retroactively.
The missing minutes have become a hot political debate, with opposition lawmakers saying they are necessary to provide a transparent record of the government's discussion after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami touched off the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl in 1986.
Deputy Prime Minister Katsuya Okada confirmed Friday at a news conference that the minutes were not fully recorded at the time and called for them to be written up, retroactively, by the end of February. Three of the meetings during the chaotic period had no record at all, not even an agenda, including a government nuclear crisis meeting headed by the prime minister. (AP)
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Nintendo chief promises to do Wii U launch right
Nintendo's chief is determined to get right the launch of its next game machine, Wii U, set for this year's holiday shopping season, and acknowledged Friday some mistakes with selling its 3DS handheld.
But Nintendo Co. President Satoru Iwata warned earnings for the fiscal year set to begin April will be the toughest ever for the Japanese manufacturer behind the Super Mario and Pokemon games.
Iwata's remarks come a day after it lowered its annual earnings forecast to a 65 billion yen ($844 million) loss, much larger than the 20 billion yen ($260 million) loss projected earlier. It posted a 77.62 billion yen profit the previous fiscal year. (AP)
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Tokyo stocks close flat
Tokyo stocks have closed flat as investors cautiously looked to a European Union leaders meeting next week.
The Nikkei 225 index at the Tokyo Stock Exchange edged down 0.09 per cent or 8.25 points to 8841.22 on Friday. The Topix index of all first-section issues lost 0.46 per cent or 3.48 points to 761.13.
Shares stayed rangebound following declines in US stocks on Thursday on data including weaker-than-expected December home sales.
Dealers said investors stepped aside as they looked to the EU summit meeting on Monday. (ninemsn.com.au)
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Japan movie box-office revenues plunge 17.9% in 2011
Movie box-office revenues in Japan last year plunged 17.9 percent from an all-time high in the previous year to 181.2 billion yen due to the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that devastated northeastern Japan, a film industry body said Thursday.
The number of movies released in Japan came to 799, up 80 from the previous year, but there was no blockbuster, the association said, adding that the number of viewers also dropped by 30 million to 145 million, the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan said.
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2" achieved top revenues at 9.67 billion yen. (Mainichi)
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Chinese man charged for Japan embassy attack in S Korea
Prosecutors in South Korea have charged a Chinese man with attempted arson for hurling Molotov cocktails at the Japanese embassy in Seoul.
The 38-year-old from Guangzhou in southern China was identified only by his family name, Liu.
He told officials that his grandmother was forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese army during World War II.
He allegedly threw four petrol bombs that left burn marks on the embassy's outer wall earlier this month.
According to South Korean media, he has been in police custody since 8 January.
He reportedly entered South Korea on a tourist visa on 26 December 2011 via Japan. He also claimed to be responsible for an arson attack at the Yasukuni shrine last month. (BBC)
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Korean War criminals tried as Japanese
Hiromura Gakurai was a prison guard at the Hintok work camp along the Thailand-Burma "death railway," infamous for the extremely high human toll on the Allied prisoners of war (POWs) and local Asian slave laborers during World War II.
After the war, he was tried and sentenced to death by an Australian military court for inhumane treatment of POWs but commuted to 20 years' imprisonment and released on parole in 1956.
Hiromura's case may not stand out among over 5,700 war criminals in the Asia-Pacific region ― except he was a sharecropper's son named Lee Hak-rae from Korea, then under Japanese colonial rule. And he is not alone: 148 Koreans and 173 Taiwanese were convicted as war criminals, of which 23 Koreans and 26 Taiwanese were executed.
Most Korean war criminals were lowly prison guards ranking below buck privates. On paper, they were "volunteers"; in practice, certain military conscription or industrial slave labor awaited as an alternative. Some 3,000 Koreans manned the Japanese POW camps in Southeast Asia. (Korea Times)
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Cabinet OKs child allowance bill; fight looms to gain passage by March
The Cabinet approved a bill Friday to create a new child allowance system starting April 1, replacing the present framework that expires at the end of March.
Although the ruling Democratic Party of Japan hopes the bill clears the Diet by the end of March, the Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito have signaled they will oppose it.
Without the rival camp's support the government will be unable to pass the bill through the divided Diet, where opposition parties control the Upper House, and the legislation's prospects at this stage remain murky. (Japan Times)
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Eagles' star pitcher to wed celebrity
Rakuten Eagles pitcher Masahiro Tanaka is set to tie the knot with TV celebrity and singer Mai Satoda.
The Sendai-based baseball team announced Thursday that 23-year-old Tanaka and Satoda, 27, plan to submit marriage papers in late March before the professional baseball season starts.
"I would like to excel in my career so that my most important person can live her life in comfort and smiles," Tanaka, who won the 2011 Sawamura Award for outstanding pitching, said.
(Japan Times)
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Huge Yamanashi solar farm online
A solar power plant with a capacity of 10 megawatts began operating Friday in Kofu, Yamanashi Prefecture.
The Komekurayama power station, built by Tokyo Electric Power Co. on a 12.5-hectare site, is one of the largest photovoltaic facilities in Japan and produces enough electricity to power around 3,400 homes.
The site is being leased to Tepco for free by the Yamanashi Prefectural Government.
Landlocked Yamanashi receives plenty of sunshine and is trying to attract solar power plant projects. In addition to the one in Kofu, other projects are proceeding in the cities of Kai and Nirasaki.
(Japan Times)
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Glitches to cost DoCoMo execs
NTT DoCoMo Inc. President Ryuji Yamada and five other executives will face a pay cut over a series of communications service disruptions since last year, the company said Friday, while announcing a ¥164 billion system improvement plan.
Yamada was expected to unveil to reporters the company's plan to beef up its data transmission facilities by spending several billion yen, the carrier said.
The disruptions were caused by DoCoMo's failure to cope with increased data traffic following the rapid spread of data-hungry smartphones. (Japan Times)
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1 killed, 21 injured in vehicle collision in SW Japan
One person was killed and 21 others were injured in a collision involving a truck of Japan's Ground Self-Defense Force and a tourist bus Saturday morning in Kumamato Prefecture in southwestern Japan, local press reported.
The accident occurred at around 8:35 a.m. local time when the truck and the bus carrying some 40 passengers collided inside a tunnel on the Kyushu Expressway near the city of Yatsushiro, the report said, adding that a 39-year-old tour conductor on the bus was killed and 21 passengers were injured, one of them seriously..
The accident happened when the GSDF truck changed lanes and hit the bus which was in the overtaking lane. (CRIENGLISH.com)
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Active 200-km fault found off Honshu's Kii Peninsula
An active fault around 200 km long that is believed to have been a source of huge quakes in the past has been found off Honshu's Kii Peninsula, according to researchers at the University of Tokyo.
If the fault on the Nankai Trough moves, it could trigger a magnitude 8.0 earthquake, the researchers said, adding they have found a seabed cliff several hundred meters high that was created by the fault's past movements.
"There is a high probability that fault shifts have caused great tsunami," said Park Jin Oh, associate professor of marine geology. (Japan Times)
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Talent agency's charity to provide billions for pandas
A charity established by a talent agency to support reconstruction in the northeast expects to shoulder several billion yen of the cost of leasing giant pandas from China for a zoo in Sendai.
Singer Masahiko Kondo, 47, who represents the Marching J charity set up by Johnny & Associates Inc., said it will cover the expenses estimated for the initial five-year period.
"We want to bring back smiles to as many children as possible," Kondo said.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has expressed a willingness to lease two giant pandas to the Sendai zoo in an effort to brighten the lives of children in Tohoku. (Japan Times)
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Fish tales of Tsukiji
Streets are bathed in indigo hues when I emerge from the Hibiya subway line's Tsukiji Station, heading for Tsukiji Oroshiuri Shijo which, though its name translates simply as "Tsukiji Wholesale Market," is actually the world's largest fish market. At 6 a.m., it's too late to catch the famed tuna or melon auctions, but I've got scaled-back ambitions. Fish stories and a filet or two will do.
Heading south on Shin Ohashi avenue, with Tsukiji's Jogai Shijo (outer market) on my left, I pass through clouds of steam from sidewalk ramen shops. What changes there must have been in this area, I muse, since it first began to rise as landfill from Tokyo Bay in the Edo Period (1603-1867). By the mid-1600s, fishermen living on both the new mudflats of Tsukiji and raised islands across the Sumida River were netting the primary source of protein for the estimated half a million residents of Edo (present-day Tokyo). (Japan Times)
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In disparity-ridden Japan, don't mind the gaps - just get out of them
When the term kakusa shakai came into vogue in 2006 - a fairly self-explanatory expression given that kakusa means "gap" or "disparity," and shakai means "society" - it was a clear sign of Japanese people having finally recognized that the notion of theirs being a hope-filled nation of upwardly mobile middle-class people was a myth.
In fact, being a highly stratified country, Japan has always been riddled with gaps. And its social strata, like layers of rock from different eras piled on top of each other, don't readily mix with each other.
It takes something on the seismic scale of the 1868 Meiji Restoration, which marked the overthrow of centuries of military government under the Tokugawa Shogunate, and the social revolution of the latter half of the 19th century, to dislodge and remix the strata. (Japan Times)
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