Mainichi Daily News articles from September 2000

Mainichi Daily News archives from September 2000

Japan settles for softball silver.
September 30, 2000... SYDNEY -- The U.S. women's softball team dealt Japan its first loss of the Olympic tournament on Tuesday, unfortunately it was for the gold medal. The defending champion rallied from 1-0 down in the fifth to win 2-1 in extra innings. ...

EDITORIAL: Japan-ROK Summit.
September 30, 2000... Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and South Korean President Kim Dae-jung held discussions in a casual atmosphere during their summit meeting in Atami, Shizuoka Prefecture over the weekend. The relaxed mood of the summit reflects the recent...

Study: Baby chimp no chump.
September 30, 2000... INUYAMA, Aichi -- Four- month-old Ayumu is teething and toddling and always grabbing hold of furniture. He also tries to grab hold of anyone around and interrupts his intelligent mother, Ai, when she's studying. Ayumu's playfulness keeps...

Trans-Atlantic sailing trip shows trainees the ropes.
September 30, 2000... Young Japanese trainees aboard Osaka's municipally-owned sail training ship, Akogare, recently completed a 23-day, 5,200-kilometer trans-Atlantic race, the last and largest race in this century. In the subsequent Sail Amsterdam 2000 in...

Ex-kamikaze builds friendship bridge.
September 30, 2000... A former member of Japan's suicide squad during World War II, Kaoru Hasegawa, was rescued by the U.S. Navy after his bomber was shot down. With his enemy turned rescuers, Hasegawa is now helping to build a friendship bridge over the Pacific...

Doctor releases CD to help AIDS patients.
September 30, 2000... A compact disc of black spiritual music has been released by a former member of Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF), a Nobel laureate non-governmental organization of doctors engaged in worldwide medical emergencies. Proceeds will be used to help...

Centenarian keeps plucking.
September 30, 2000... In Japan's aging society, over 13,000 people are centenarians, according to a recent survey by the Health and Welfare Ministry. Of these 13,000, jiuta performer Hatsuko Kikuhara, 101, is a national treasure. Singing with the accompaniment...

Furthermore: Debt-ridden temple attracts supporters.
September 30, 2000... OTSU -- In an unprecedented move, a debt-ridden Buddhist temple here is offering membership for 250,000 yen in sign-up fees and 6,000 yen in annual fees, regardless of sect. The Enman-in Temple in Otsu belongs to the Tendai sect and is...

Legislators break word on hiring: Diet members still employing kin as state-paid secretarial staff.
September 30, 2000... At least 127 -- or about 20 percent -- of the 732 members of the Diet employ relatives in state-funded secretarial positions, a recent survey conducted by the Mainichi Shimbun has shown. The practice persists despite an agreement that...

Quake-hit landlords get surprise tax bills.
September 30, 2000... Landlords who received what they believed were tax-free subsidies from a foundation set up to assist victims of the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake are expressing their perplexment now that the taxman has come knocking on their doors after all....

Toxic phenols taint Fukuoka tap water.
September 30, 2000... WAKAMIYA, Fukuoka --High levels of phenol-type toxic chemicals have been detected in groundwater near a site here where industrial waste was illegally dumped, municipal government officials said Tuesday. A survey conducted by the Wakamiya...

Lawyer wants murderer to face victim.
September 30, 2000... An elderly man grabbed the attention of the Tokyo High Court when he displayed a picture of his slain wife to the man in the dock responsible for her murder during an appeal hearing on Tuesday. The action of 71-year-old Isao Okamura --...

Public approval still eludes Mori's grasp.
September 30, 2000... Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori has again failed in achieving his coveted aim of raising public support for his Cabinet as quickly as possible, as a recent Mainichi poll found its approval rate remained low at a mere 20 percent. Disapproval...

Briefly: Kansai kidnapper facing 12 years in jail.
September 30, 2000... A former city official from Osaka Prefecture faces the prospect of more than a decade behind bars after prosecutors at the Osaka District Court on Tuesday demanded that he serve a 12-year term for kidnapping an 8-year-old girl last December....

Truck drags woman in wheelchair to death.
September 30, 2000... FURANO, Hokkaido -- An elderly wheelchair-bound woman was killed here after being hit by a truck and dragged for nearly 40 meters early on Tuesday, police said. Kimiko Ikeda, 75, was attempting to cross a road around 6:50 a.m. in an...

Yomiuri writer busted for sex with minor.
September 30, 2000... YOKOHAMA -- A 41-year-old Yomiuri Shimbun staff writer has been arrested for engaging in sex with a teen-age girl late last month, police said Tuesday. Shinichi Yamada of Wako, Saitama Prefecture, is being detained on charges of...

Fall proves fatal for wall-climbing student.
September 30, 2000... A male university student fell to his death as he tried to climb down the wall of a 14-story building in Tokyo's Shibuya-ku late Monday evening, police said Tuesday. The 24-year-old student, whose name is being withheld, was found lying...

Con man tricks shopkeeper with new notes.
September 30, 2000... AOMORI -- A man defrauded the elderly owner of a tobacco shop here on Monday by conning her into mistaking new 2,000-yen notes for 5,000-yen notes, police said Tuesday. Investigators suspect the man took advantage of unfamiliarity with...

Obituary: Saburo Sakai - Ace World War II fighter pilot.
September 30, 2000... The nation's top Zero fighter pilot Saburo Sakai, who downed 64 Allied planes during World War II, died suddenly of heart failure last Friday at a hospital in Kanagawa Prefecture. He was 84. At Sakai's request, only close relatives...

Sogo hid 30 billion yen in losses.
September 30, 2000... Failed department store operator Sogo Co.'s former man-agement apparently used a "sly plot" to cover up as much as 30 billion yen in losses the com-pany had incurred in luxury goods sales in 1996, the Mainichi learned Wednesday. The...

Nagata wrestles way to silver.
September 30, 2000... Katsuhiko Nagata's dream run at gold in Greco-Roman wrestling fell short on Wednesday when he came up against mighty Cuban Olympic champion Filiberto Azcuy. The Atlanta gold medalist dominated Nagata in the 69-kilogram class, smothering...

EDITORIAL: New recycling priorities.
September 30, 2000... Japan has been spinning its wheels in its war against garbage. In spite of various action plans, the nation's annual output of industrial waste and general household garbage has not diminished. And since citizens oppose construction of new...

ASIASCOPE: Thai AIDS kids not left to wait for death: Features on Asia from Japanese magazines.
September 30, 2000... AIDS orphans 7,000 Thai children a year, says Shukan Kinyobi (9/15). One third of those AIDS orphans are themselves born with the disease. Miwa Natori, 54, was working as a designer in Italy. Three years ago she travelled to Chiang Mai...

Calcutta's rickshaw men endure tough lives as the ...
September 30, 2000... great survivors Most days, working on a 12-hour shift, Singh takes home a paltry 50 rupees (little more than 1 dollar). 'For the back-breaking work, the reward is miserable,' he cries. Calcutta's legendary rickshaw lives...

Four nabbed over Hyogo marriage scam.
September 30, 2000... AKASHI, Hyogo -- Four people, including a former immigration official, involved in a fake marriage between an illegal immigrant and a teacher, have been arrested, police said Wednesday. Police arrested Pae Hyo-seon, a 33-year-old...

Eye doctors leading punters up blind alley.
September 30, 2000... People looking for a cure for their shortsightedness are being led up a blind alley due to contrasting signals sent to them by the nation's two leading eye specialist organizations. One of them, the Japan Ophthalmologists Association,...

Osaka city gov't in towering rage over ads.
September 30, 2000... Two banners advertising the upcoming national census put up around the supports of the landmark Tsutenkaku Tower caused a bureaucratic stir when the city of Osaka, which owns the advertising rights for the tower, claimed the local...

Judicial reformers mull jury trials.
September 30, 2000... The nation's judiciary should consider the possibility of reinstating the jury system to let courts hear the views and opinions of nonlegal professionals during trials, members of a justice system reform council have agreed. Now that the...

Briefly: Police set to charge Snow Brand officials.
September 30, 2000... TAIKI, Hokkaido -- Police are poised to press charges against officials of a local plant of the Snow Brand Milk Products Co. for the recent mass food poisoning in the Osaka area. The Osaka plant, whose milk products were tainted, was...

Prof noses out smell of success.
September 30, 2000... Olympic athletes in Sydney should be aware that nice fragrances may enhance their stamina but nasty smells have the opposite effects, an expert's test has found. Yoshihiko Koga, a neurology professor at Kyorin University's medical...

Jealous student stabs elementary teacher.
September 30, 2000... A 17-year-old girl from Hyogo Prefecture was arrested for stabbing an elementary school teacher apparently because she was infuriated the woman was dating a high school teacher she was also involved with, police said. Police received a...

Trio rob pachinko staffer of 20 million yen.
September 30, 2000... Three men robbed a pachinko prize exchange shop employee of a bag containing some 20 million yen in cash in Tokyo's Ota-ku on Wednesday morning, police said. Kamata Police Station officials said that the three men approached the employee...

Cops ecstatic over huge drug haul.
September 30, 2000... Police on Wednesday arrested a foreign man for smuggling an unprecedented number of ecstasy pills into the country, officials said. David Reouven Bitton, 32, an unemployed man of both French and Israeli nationalities, has been charged...

School accountant busted for embezzlement.
September 30, 2000... A former preparatory-school accountant who used a company seal to withdraw 140 million yen from school bank accounts for "hush money" has been arrested, police said Wednesday. Keiichi Murasato, 36, a former accountant at Tokyo-based...

Cops bust drifter for Yamanashi murder.
September 30, 2000... ISAWA, Yamanashi -- A jobless 60-year-old man was arrested Wednesday for knifing a man to death here last week, police said. Kaoru Amemiya, of no fixed address, was held on suspicion of killing Koichi Horiuchi, a 48-year-old unemployed...

Press wary of bill on personal information.
September 30, 2000... The fourth estate should be free to investigate and disclose the personal details of public figures because any legal obligation to refrain from doing so could limit the scope of journalism, an organization representing more than 110 of the...

Tokyo Bay used as sewer: Metropolitan Gov't could face charges.
September 27, 2000... YOKOHAMA -- Tokyo Metropolitan Government sewage processing plants have been discharging untreated sewage water full of lumps of oil into Tokyo Bay for "emergency" reasons, the Mainichi learned Monday. Numerous oily lumps, about 10...

Japan playing US for softball gold.
September 27, 2000... SYDNEY -- Japan advanced to its first gold medal game in Olympic softball on Monday, edging past Australia 1-0. Japan will face the United States with Australia playing off against China for the bronze. The United States beat China 3-0...

Making a point.
September 27, 2000... An Indonesian farmer holds a mock sickle to the neck of another farmer during a protest outside the presidential palace in Jakarta on Monday. The farmers were demanding government subsidies and the return of land they claim was seized by the...

EDITORIAL: An honorable exit.
September 27, 2000... Conditions in Peru are critical. President Alberto Fujimori, who had just begun his third term as president in July, suddenly announced on Sept. 16 that he was exiting power early to take responsibility for his spy chief's bribery attempt....

Sidelight: Takahashi's marathon victory.
September 27, 2000... Just after she broke the tape at the finish line in the women's marathon in Sydney's Olympic Stadium on Sunday, Naoko Takahashi looked desperately for someone in the huge crowd applauding her victory. Yoshio Koyama, her coach, wasn't around....

Taking stock: Making a Splash: For today's consumers, there's a lot more to water than meets the eye.
September 27, 2000... Water, that most basic of substances, has always been plentiful in Japan. Not only plentiful, but safe and good-tasting. Twenty years ago, Japanese visitors to Europe would come back disgusted (and somewhat surprised) that water had to be...

Art Deco oasis.
September 27, 2000... The period of the 1920s and '30s was more than a pause between two great wars. With the impact of Freudian ideas and Einstein's Theory of Relativity, as well as female suffrage, it could be argued that this was a period more revolutionary...

Exhibitions: TOKYO.
September 27, 2000... opening utsuwa: thoughts on contemporary vessels Focusing on everyday-use vessels, 160 works in ceramics, glass, metal and wood will be on display. Dates: Sept. 30-Nov. 19 (10 am-5 pm; closed Mon., Oct. 9-10) Admission: 830...

Biker attacks plague Tokyo: Police believe four brutal muggings are connected.
September 27, 2000... A spate of attacks early Monday in which bikers slashed and robbed people of their wallets in Tokyo and Saitama Prefecture has sparked an investigation into the muggings, police said Monday. Police said four possibly related attacks in...

Reformatory urged for teen slasher.
September 27, 2000... MATSUYAMA -- A student who knifed a teacher early this month should be sent to a reformatory to help him turn over a new leaf, prosecutors said Monday. The Matsuyama District Public Prosecutors Office has sent the case of the 17-year-old...

Ex-employee at Fujitsu unit busted for forging permits.
September 27, 2000... Mainichi Shimbun A former employee of a Fujitsu group subsidiary was arrested Monday on suspicion of doctoring documents for a public works project, police said. Police arrested Masahiko Sodeyama, 36, a former general affairs division...

Briefly: Prosecution clerk embezzled yen 1.2m.
September 27, 2000... NAGOYA -- A former secretary for a local public prosecutors office was slapped with a suspended sentence Monday for embezzling some 1.2 million yen in funds received from traffic fines. Kenji Wada, 32, a former secretary in the Toyota...

Briefly: Man admits to abandoning wife's son to die.
September 27, 2000... HIMEJI, Hyogo -- Police are poised to serve a fresh arrest warrant on a 47-year-old man, who has been under arrest for dumping the body of his 6-year-old son on a local mountain, after he confessed to kicking the boy off the stairs and...

Briefly: Salesman nabbed for yen 7m securities scam.
September 27, 2000... A former employee of a securities company was arrested Monday on suspicion of having swindled a client out of stock certificates worth over 7 million yen, Osaka Prefectural Police said. According to investigators, Hiroyasu Murata, 35, a...

Briefly: Miyake mulls using ash to rebuild economy.
September 27, 2000... Attempting to kill two birds with one stone, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government is planning to use tons of volcanic ash that fell on Miyake Island as material to make glass and other products that would provide the foundation to rebuild the...

Briefly: Fishing boat captain dies in collision at sea.
September 27, 2000... KURASHIKI, Okayama -- The captain of a fishing boat was killed when a freighter rammed into the side of his ship, sinking it early on Monday, the Japan Coast Guard said. Kiyoichi Kawate, 68, the captain of the Ebisu Maru No. 3, was...

NHK caught in license fee row.
September 26, 2000... The Japan Broadcasting Corp. (NHK) promised to refund its license fee to a viewer who complained that NHK covers the Sydney Olympics too much at the expense of news programs -- but it later rescinded the offer, it was learned Friday. NHK...

Hospital sued over lethal mix-up: Victim's family launches Yen 145 mil. suit over botched treatment.
September 26, 2000... The bereaved family of a woman, who died after nurses at a Tokyo taxpayer-funded hospital mistakenly administered disinfectant to her through an intravenous (IV) drip, sued former hospital doctors and administrators for compensation on...

Couple dumps son's dead body.
September 26, 2000... HIMEJI, Hyogo -- A couple here has been placed under arrest for dumping the body of their 6-year-old son, after several pieces of bone believed to be from the child were found on a local mountain on Thursday, police said. Osamu Yamamoto,...

Student confesses to bomb threats.
September 26, 2000... NISHIYATSUSHIRO, Yamanashi -- A 17-year-old high school student has admitted to sending bomb threats to a prefectural school here that forced the school to suspend classes for half an hour, it was learned Friday. Investigators are...

Pollution-suit plaintiffs hail court ruling.
September 26, 2000... Plaintiffs in the so-called Amagasaki pollution suit were overjoyed by Thursday's decision by the Osaka High Court to close deliberations on the appeal from the national government and the Hanshin Expressway Public Corp., following the high...

Tama Uni. breaks with exam tradition.
September 26, 2000... In an unusual move for a country notorious for its fierce entrance exam competition, Tama University plans to admit a small number of applicants who have failed their entrance exams and later examine whether to officially receive them. ...

Young pianist defies disability.
September 26, 2000... A 12-year-old blind pianist will take his first bold step toward attaining his dream of becoming a spell-binding performer with his first solo concert in Tokyo on Sunday. His parents and supporters hope that the boy's performance at the...

TV star busted for fleeing accident scene.
September 26, 2000... Popular TV celebrity Mitsuo Senda was arrested on Friday over suspicion that he fled after his car hit another car, injuring the driver in downtown Tokyo, police said. Senda, 53, from Setagaya-ku, told police he had drank a few glasses...

Cops like job but miss public cooperation.
September 26, 2000... Police officers conducting investigations feel a real sense of duty but need more cooperation from citizens in tracking down criminals, a survey conducted by the National Police Agency has found. The poll covered some 2,300 police...

Man kills wife, stabs self, in dispute.
September 26, 2000... KIKUGAWA, Shizuoka -- An enraged man apparently went berserk, stabbing his wife to death on Friday morning after the woman -- who was half his age -- threatened to leave him, police said. A neighbor in Kikugawa, Shizuoka Prefecture,...

US ousts Japan on PKs.
September 26, 2000... SYDNEY -- What a dive! Down 2-1 in injury time, American Josh Wolff, chasing a loose ball in the penalty area with Japan's Tomoyuki Sakai, did what you do in those situations -- hit the deck. Most referees don't buy it anymore, this...

EDITORIAL: Fuzzy blueprint.
September 26, 2000... In his policy speech to the Diet on Friday, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori vowed to turn the nation into a global leader in information technology (IT) in five years. While his speech to the extraordinary session of Japan's national legislature...

WAIWAI: FACE of the WEEKLIES.
September 26, 2000... What's it like? "Like running into your first love on the street. Only it took me eight years." Ryoko Tamura kissing gold. It will surely stand as one of the enduring images of the 2000 Olympics, and why not? "It's the best day of my...

Nissan covers up toxic cesspool: Plant had carcinogen concentrations 15,700 higher than standards.
September 26, 2000... Nissan Motor Co. detected concentrations of a carcinogenic substance more than 15,700 times above the government-allowable level at a former Tokyo plant back in 1994, but failed to announce the finding, company officials admitted. Asked...

Opposition slams school community service.
September 26, 2000... Opposition parties have criticized a proposal by a government panel calling for obligatory community service for all elementary, junior high and senior high school students to nurture their sense of self-reliance and civic spirit. "The...

Tokyo residents jam train escalator project.
September 26, 2000... An escalator construction project at a Tokyo railway station has met with a hitch since locals demanded East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) suspend the plan -- which the company claims is designed to help all users of the station. Facing...

Teacher sacking kept secret to shield victim.
September 26, 2000... FUKUSHIMA -- Fukushima prefectural education authorities did not disclose until late last week that it had fired a male junior high school teacher for molesting a male student in order to protect the victim's privacy, officials said. "It...

University fires professor for harassment.
September 26, 2000... SENDAI -- State-run Tohoku University has sacked an associate professor who reportedly forced a female assistant in her 20s to start a sexual relationship with him, it was learned over the weekend. The decision, which was reached during a...

2 nabbed for running guns by yacht.
September 26, 2000... NAHA -- Two men have been arrested for attempting to smuggle dozens of guns and over 1,000 bullets by yacht into Ishigaki Island, Okinawa Prefecture, police said Saturday. Sadao Miyoshi, 34, a self-employed man of Ishigaki, and Hiroyuki...

Trucker arrested over ex-wife's slaying.
September 26, 2000... MATSUSAKA, Mie --A truck driver was arrested Saturday on suspicion of dumping the body of his former common-law wife in a forest here, local police said. Etsushi Okada, 36, has been accused of abandoning the body of Fumiko Miyazaki, 44,...

EDITORIAL: Educational reform.
September 26, 2000... The interim report submitted on Friday by the National Commission on Educational Reform to Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori contains suggestions in 17 areas and covers all phases of education, from preschoolers to higher learning. It proposes some...

United Nations Environment Programme International.
September 26, 2000... Photographic Competition on the Environment 1999-2000 The Gold Prize in the Adult Division of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) International Photographic Competition on the Environment 1999-2000 was awarded to Hartmut...

West: events announcements.
September 26, 2000... ANNOUNCEMENTS Kobe Women's Club (KWC) programs to be held in October are described below. Programs are held on the second and third Tuesdays at 10:30 a.m. (unless otherwise noted) at the Kobe Club in Chuo-ku, Kobe. All programs are...

JALT 2000.
September 26, 2000... The Japan Association for Language Teaching (JALT)'s 26th Annual International Conference on Language Teaching and Educational Materials Expo, "JALT 2000," is slated for Nov. 2 and will run through Nov. 5 in Shizuoka. "Toward the New...

Anne Frank: A rose blooming in the Holocaust.
September 26, 2000... On July 15 1944, German-Jewish Anne Frank, the second daughter of Otto and Edith Frank, confessed in her diary that even though numerous uncomfortable incidents occurred at that time, she still believed that the nature of human beings was...

O-kabuki programs in October.
September 26, 2000... As part of the National Performing Arts Festival, Kabuki-za presents four gala-type well-known Kabuki plays in the morning, along with Ennosuke Ichikawa's full-scale play, "Kagamiyama Gonichi no Iwafuji," in October. Matinee program ...

The World of Bunraku: Bunraku for October.
September 26, 2000... There are two overriding principles that govern everything in both the worlds of Bunraku and Kabuki. Understanding those principles and how they operate is a prerequisite for understanding how everything comes together and how everyone...

DANCE, DRAMA, MUSIC & EVENTS: LECTURE.
September 26, 2000... A lecture and performance of Kyogen, a 600-year-old traditional Japanese comedy, will be given Oct. 1 in Takarazuka, Hyogo Prefecture by Chuichiro Zenchiku and family. The lecture and plots of the play will have an English translation. This...

Seoul celebrates opening of JW Marriott Hotel.
September 26, 2000... Marriott representatives and members of the Central Tourist Development Co. of Korea gathered Sept. 1 to celebrate the grand opening of the magnificent JW Marriott Hotel Seoul. The hotel, which at 34 floors towers above surrounding...

Giants slam way to CL pennant.
September 26, 2000... The Yomiuri Giants clinched the Central League pennant in stunning style with a ninth-inning grand slam homer against the Chunichi Dragons at the Tokyo Dome on Sunday night. Giants slugger Akira Etoh clobbered the grand slam against...

Mori dependent on Korean relations: S. Korea's Kim also needs North ties to save saggingreputation at home.
September 26, 2000... North Korea was a "shadow actor" in the weekend's Japan-South Korea summit talks in Tokyo, even though the two leaders discussed bilateral issues, diplomatic sources said. "It's very important to communicate effectively (with North...

Keio Uni. fetes 21st century: Plans to top 1900's party without guns.
September 26, 2000... In less than 100 days, the 21st century will arrive, and event-seekers around the globe are no doubt racking their brains for ideas as to how to celebrate the turn of the century. Tokyo's prestigious Keio University is one of the...