The Truth and Reconciliation Commission says South Korean authorities massacred at least 4,934 civilians suspected of being North Korean sympathizers.
By John M. Glionna
November 27, 2009
Reporting from Seoul
Shedding new light on a long-suppressed chapter of the Korean War, a government commission acknowledged Thursday that South Korean soldiers and police executed about 5,000 suspected North Korean sympathizers during the early months of the conflict.
In the first acknowledgment of the death toll, the so-called Truth and Reconciliation Commission said South Korean authorities rounded up and massacred at least 4,934 civilians during the summer of 1950.
Evidence of the atrocities was hidden for decades under the military-backed authoritarian regimes that ruled South Korea until the nation embraced democracy in the 1980s.
The commission in 2005 began investigating the civilian executions, interviewing several people who took part in the killings during the first phase of the 1950-53 war. It also reviewed photographs of mass, makeshift graves.
News of the commission's finding was treated almost nonchalantly in South Korea, carried as an inside story by several of the nation's major newspapers.
"The country should have paid attention to this case consistently, but so far it has not," said Kim Jeong-ho, 62, whose father was among the victims.
Still, historians here said they believed the findings would have a cathartic effect on the nation.
"One hidden piece of our tragic history in the 1950s was revealed. We should not repeat this miserable history, and this case will do good for the unity and integrity of the society," said Park Sun-joo, a history professor at Chungbuk National University who heads the excavation project of the commission.
He said he hopes the government will build a memorial to the victims.
Many victims were reportedly associated with the National Guidance League, created by the South Korean government to re-educate suspected communist sympathizers.
To meet strictly enforced membership quotas, officials often pressured apolitical farmers into joining the group, using promises of rice rations or other benefits, the commission said.
The panel also found that the executions were carried out based on "decisions and orders" from the "highest level" of government.
Kim said that family members of the victims faced discrimination for decades after the war.
"It is beyond description -- the social prejudice and mental anguish that we have been through," he said.
Commissioners also included several recommendations, including that the government offer an official apology as well as pass legislation to compensate victims' families.
Park, the historian, said the government should also pursue prosecutions.
"A high court has said the statute of limitations on this killing case has passed," he said.
"But personally, I don't think the judiciary should view this case that way: It is a crime against humanity."
But Kim disagreed.
"Even if there are some offenders still alive, I simply do not want to see them punished," he said.
"Not only is it legally tough to prosecute them, but it is more appropriate that families of victims and offenders meet . . . and reconcile with each other.
"For the sake of social unity, it is right to make a reconciliation."
john.glionna@latimes.com
Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
Monday, November 30, 2009
China's climate pledge raises expectations for Copenhagen summit
Although China's announcement that it will reduce the intensity of its greenhouse gas emissions does not mean a reduction in total emissions, environmentalists now see more promise for climate summit.
By David Pierson and Jim Tankersley
5:16 PM PST, November 27, 2009
Reporting from Washington and Beijing
China vowed Thursday to steeply reduce the intensity of its greenhouse gas emissions over the next decade, a move that environmentalists and the Obama administration hailed as a major, and perhaps decisive, development toward agreement on a comprehensive climate treaty.
The announcement came a day after President Obama unveiled a provisional target to reduce carbon emissions in the United States, and said he would attend climate negotiations in Copenhagen next month.
The promises by the two largest emitters of the gases that scientists blame for global warming dramatically raised expectations for the Copenhagen summit. Until this week, many climate activists considered the prospects for the Dec. 7-18 conference bleak.
The U.S. and Chinese announcements offer a "very much needed boost going into the final steps before Copenhagen," said Jake Schmidt, international climate policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Chinese announcement "is a pretty strong signal that China is ready to move forward aggressively on clean energy and global warming," he added.
China's State Council said that by 2020 the country would reduce its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by 40% to 45% compared with levels in 2005.
This is "a voluntary action based on our own national conditions" and "is a major contribution to the global effort in tackling climate change," the State Council said.
Although the cuts were welcomed, Greenpeace China said the targets did not go far enough, considering the Asian nation's emissions are expected to continue rising. A pledge in the 45% to 50% range would have been better, it said.
And China's gross domestic product is expected to grow, so its total emissions might not drop.
China's pledge was met enthusiastically by leaders in Europe and at the United Nations, where climate chief Yvo de Boer said the vows of emission reductions by China and the United States could help "unlock" an international treaty to curb climate change.
The White House also praised the move by Beijing.
"We welcome China's intention to cut the growth of their emissions by reducing the carbon intensity of their economy," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.
"Building on the president's productive talks in Beijing, the United States will continue to engage constructively with China on this and other elements of the negotiations going into Copenhagen."
Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute, noted that the two countries will need to go further in their pledges to reach the levels of commitment of some other nations.
"But the road to an international agreement is now open more than ever," he said.
Still, there were signs Thursday that negotiators have more work to do before completing even a preliminary climate deal in Copenhagen -- and that some countries, particularly those that scientists call most vulnerable to climate change, were unimpressed with this week's announcements.
A group of small island nations Thursday criticized what it called a "lack of ambition" on the part of the United States and other wealthy nations, saying the world's most developed countries must curb emissions more than they've pledged and offer billions of dollars in financial assistance to the developing world. Those island nations wield considerable power in international climate talks.
"These proposals are missing critical elements," Grenada's foreign affairs minister, Peter David, who chairs the 43-member Alliance of Small Island States, said in a statement. But he later added: "With clear, ambitious commitments and actions from the developed countries, individually and collectively, we know that we can succeed."
Schmidt, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, predicted that the negotiators would eventually rally around the "critical" engagement of the United States and China during the conference in Denmark.
In the meantime, he said, "I'm sure there'll be some grumbling in the first week, first week and a half at Copenhagen."
In making its announcement about emission cuts, the Chinese government also said Premier Wen Jiabao would attend the Copenhagen summit.
"Wen's presence at the meeting fully embodies the Chinese government's great attention to the issue and its political willingness to address the issue with international cooperation," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a news conference in Beijing.
Despite Greenpeace China's disappointment that Beijing had not gone farther in its pledge, the group's climate campaign manager said that the recent moves by China and the U.S. show a willingness to lead the globe toward a climate solution.
"They're definitely feeling the heat from Copenhagen," said manager Yang Ailun. "The two big countries are setting up a good foundation. China will have to be more energy efficient, which means more renewable energy. They'll have to tackle their over-dependency on coal."
China and the U.S. have sparred over emission reduction commitments.
Beijing is reluctant to agree to any cuts that would jeopardize its economic growth and believes that developed nations, as the biggest polluters historically, should assume a larger share of overall reductions.
Washington has asserted that global warming cannot be stemmed unless China agrees to ambitious cuts. Some lawmakers are reluctant to enter binding agreements unless China and India do too, for fear it will make the U.S. less economically competitive.
On Wednesday, the White House said the U.S. would "put on the table" a commitment to reduce overall emissions by around 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, and 83% by 2050.
The pledge is consistent with language in a climate bill stalled in the Senate, but it is also different from the Chinese plan because it aims to lower total emissions from 2005 levels.
China's total emissions could still go up compared with 2005 because its economic output is expected to climb. However, with the new pledge, China would do so at a slower rate.
david.pierson@latimes.com
jtankersley@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By David Pierson and Jim Tankersley
5:16 PM PST, November 27, 2009
Reporting from Washington and Beijing
China vowed Thursday to steeply reduce the intensity of its greenhouse gas emissions over the next decade, a move that environmentalists and the Obama administration hailed as a major, and perhaps decisive, development toward agreement on a comprehensive climate treaty.
The announcement came a day after President Obama unveiled a provisional target to reduce carbon emissions in the United States, and said he would attend climate negotiations in Copenhagen next month.
The promises by the two largest emitters of the gases that scientists blame for global warming dramatically raised expectations for the Copenhagen summit. Until this week, many climate activists considered the prospects for the Dec. 7-18 conference bleak.
The U.S. and Chinese announcements offer a "very much needed boost going into the final steps before Copenhagen," said Jake Schmidt, international climate policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Chinese announcement "is a pretty strong signal that China is ready to move forward aggressively on clean energy and global warming," he added.
China's State Council said that by 2020 the country would reduce its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product by 40% to 45% compared with levels in 2005.
This is "a voluntary action based on our own national conditions" and "is a major contribution to the global effort in tackling climate change," the State Council said.
Although the cuts were welcomed, Greenpeace China said the targets did not go far enough, considering the Asian nation's emissions are expected to continue rising. A pledge in the 45% to 50% range would have been better, it said.
And China's gross domestic product is expected to grow, so its total emissions might not drop.
China's pledge was met enthusiastically by leaders in Europe and at the United Nations, where climate chief Yvo de Boer said the vows of emission reductions by China and the United States could help "unlock" an international treaty to curb climate change.
The White House also praised the move by Beijing.
"We welcome China's intention to cut the growth of their emissions by reducing the carbon intensity of their economy," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.
"Building on the president's productive talks in Beijing, the United States will continue to engage constructively with China on this and other elements of the negotiations going into Copenhagen."
Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute, noted that the two countries will need to go further in their pledges to reach the levels of commitment of some other nations.
"But the road to an international agreement is now open more than ever," he said.
Still, there were signs Thursday that negotiators have more work to do before completing even a preliminary climate deal in Copenhagen -- and that some countries, particularly those that scientists call most vulnerable to climate change, were unimpressed with this week's announcements.
A group of small island nations Thursday criticized what it called a "lack of ambition" on the part of the United States and other wealthy nations, saying the world's most developed countries must curb emissions more than they've pledged and offer billions of dollars in financial assistance to the developing world. Those island nations wield considerable power in international climate talks.
"These proposals are missing critical elements," Grenada's foreign affairs minister, Peter David, who chairs the 43-member Alliance of Small Island States, said in a statement. But he later added: "With clear, ambitious commitments and actions from the developed countries, individually and collectively, we know that we can succeed."
Schmidt, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, predicted that the negotiators would eventually rally around the "critical" engagement of the United States and China during the conference in Denmark.
In the meantime, he said, "I'm sure there'll be some grumbling in the first week, first week and a half at Copenhagen."
In making its announcement about emission cuts, the Chinese government also said Premier Wen Jiabao would attend the Copenhagen summit.
"Wen's presence at the meeting fully embodies the Chinese government's great attention to the issue and its political willingness to address the issue with international cooperation," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a news conference in Beijing.
Despite Greenpeace China's disappointment that Beijing had not gone farther in its pledge, the group's climate campaign manager said that the recent moves by China and the U.S. show a willingness to lead the globe toward a climate solution.
"They're definitely feeling the heat from Copenhagen," said manager Yang Ailun. "The two big countries are setting up a good foundation. China will have to be more energy efficient, which means more renewable energy. They'll have to tackle their over-dependency on coal."
China and the U.S. have sparred over emission reduction commitments.
Beijing is reluctant to agree to any cuts that would jeopardize its economic growth and believes that developed nations, as the biggest polluters historically, should assume a larger share of overall reductions.
Washington has asserted that global warming cannot be stemmed unless China agrees to ambitious cuts. Some lawmakers are reluctant to enter binding agreements unless China and India do too, for fear it will make the U.S. less economically competitive.
On Wednesday, the White House said the U.S. would "put on the table" a commitment to reduce overall emissions by around 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, and 83% by 2050.
The pledge is consistent with language in a climate bill stalled in the Senate, but it is also different from the Chinese plan because it aims to lower total emissions from 2005 levels.
China's total emissions could still go up compared with 2005 because its economic output is expected to climb. However, with the new pledge, China would do so at a slower rate.
david.pierson@latimes.com
jtankersley@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
China makes a pledge on greenhouse gas emissions
The promise, along with a target announced by Obama the day before, raises expectations for the Copenhagen climate summit next month.
By David Pierson and Jim Tankersley
5:18 PM PST, November 27, 2009
Reporting from Washington and Beijing
China vowed Thursday to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by nearly half over the next decade, a move that environmentalists and the Obama administration hailed as a major, and perhaps decisive, development toward agreement on a comprehensive climate treaty.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
FOR THE RECORD
China's climate promise: An article in Friday's Section A incorrectly stated that China had agreed to reduce its overall carbon dioxide emissions by 40% to 45% from 2005 levels by 2020. China actually promised Thursday to reduce its "carbon intensity," a measure of carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product, by 40% to 45% by 2020, compared with 2005 levels. Also, an earlier headline on this online version of the story incorrectly said "China vows to cut greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2020."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The announcement came a day after President Obama unveiled a provisional target to reduce carbon emissions in the United States, and said he would attend climate negotiations in Copenhagen next month.
The promises by the two largest emitters of the gases that scientists blame for global warming dramatically raised expectations for the Copenhagen summit. Until this week, many climate activists considered the prospects for the Dec. 7-18 conference bleak.
The U.S. and Chinese announcements offer a "very much needed boost going into the final steps before Copenhagen," said Jake Schmidt, international climate policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Chinese announcement "is a pretty strong signal that China is ready to move forward aggressively on clean energy and global warming," he added.
China's pledge was met enthusiastically by leaders in Europe and at the United Nations, where climate chief Yvo de Boer said the vows of emission reductions by China and the United States could help "unlock" an international treaty to curb climate change.
The White House also praised the move by Beijing.
"We welcome China's intention to cut the growth of their emissions by reducing the carbon intensity of their economy," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.
"Building on the president's productive talks in Beijing, the United States will continue to engage constructively with China on this and other elements of the negotiations going into Copenhagen."
Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute, noted that the two countries will need to go further in their pledges to reach the levels of commitment of some other nations.
"But the road to an international agreement is now open more than ever," he said.
Still, there were signs Thursday that negotiators still have work to do before completing even a preliminary climate deal in Copenhagen -- and that some countries, particularly those that scientists call most vulnerable to climate change, were unimpressed with this week's announcements.
A group of small island nations Thursday criticized what it called a "lack of ambition" on the part of the United States and other wealthy nations, saying the world's most developed countries must curb emissions more than they've pledged and offer billions of dollars in financial assistance to the developing world. Those island nations wield considerable power in international climate talks.
"These proposals are missing critical elements," Grenada's foreign affairs minister, Peter David, who chairs the 43-member Alliance of Small Island States, said in a statement. But he later added: "With clear, ambitious commitments and actions from the developed countries, individually and collectively, we know that we can succeed."
Schmidt, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, predicted that the negotiators would eventually rally around the "critical" engagement of the United States and China during the conference in Denmark.
In the meantime, he said, "I'm sure there'll be some grumbling in the first week, first week and a half at Copenhagen."
In making its announcement about emission cuts, the Chinese government also said Premier Wen Jiabao would attend the Copenhagen summit.
"Wen's presence at the meeting fully embodies the Chinese government's great attention to the issue and its political willingness to address the issue with international cooperation," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a news conference in Beijing.
China's State Council said that by 2020, the country would reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 40% to 45% compared with levels in 2005.
This is "a voluntary action based on our own national conditions" and "is a major contribution to the global effort in tackling climate change," the State Council said.
Although the cuts were welcomed, Greenpeace China said the targets did not go far enough, considering the Asian nation's emissions are expected to continue rising. A pledge in the 45% to 50% range would have been better, it said.
And China's gross domestic product is expected to grow, so its total emissions might not drop.
Despite this, the recent moves by China and the U.S. show a willingness to lead the globe toward a climate solution, said Yang Ailun, climate campaign manager for Greenpeace China.
"They're definitely feeling the heat from Copenhagen," Yang said. "The two big countries are setting up a good foundation. China will have to be more energy efficient, which means more renewable energy. They'll have to tackle their over-dependency on coal."
China and the U.S. have sparred over emission reduction commitments.
Beijing is reluctant to agree to any cuts that would jeopardize its economic growth and believes that developed nations, as the biggest polluters historically, should assume a larger share of overall reductions.
Washington has asserted that global warming cannot be stemmed unless China agrees to ambitious cuts. Some lawmakers are reluctant to enter binding agreements unless China and India do too, for fear it will make the U.S. less economically competitive.
On Wednesday, the White House said the U.S. would "put on the table" a commitment to reduce emissions by around 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, and 83% by 2050.
The pledge is consistent with language in a climate bill stalled in the Senate, but it is also different from the Chinese plan because it aims to lower total emissions from 2005 levels.
China's total emissions could still go up compared with 2005 because its economic output is expected to climb. However, with the new pledge, China would do so at a slower rate.
david.pierson@latimes.com
jtankersley@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By David Pierson and Jim Tankersley
5:18 PM PST, November 27, 2009
Reporting from Washington and Beijing
China vowed Thursday to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by nearly half over the next decade, a move that environmentalists and the Obama administration hailed as a major, and perhaps decisive, development toward agreement on a comprehensive climate treaty.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
FOR THE RECORD
China's climate promise: An article in Friday's Section A incorrectly stated that China had agreed to reduce its overall carbon dioxide emissions by 40% to 45% from 2005 levels by 2020. China actually promised Thursday to reduce its "carbon intensity," a measure of carbon dioxide emissions per unit of gross domestic product, by 40% to 45% by 2020, compared with 2005 levels. Also, an earlier headline on this online version of the story incorrectly said "China vows to cut greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2020."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The announcement came a day after President Obama unveiled a provisional target to reduce carbon emissions in the United States, and said he would attend climate negotiations in Copenhagen next month.
The promises by the two largest emitters of the gases that scientists blame for global warming dramatically raised expectations for the Copenhagen summit. Until this week, many climate activists considered the prospects for the Dec. 7-18 conference bleak.
The U.S. and Chinese announcements offer a "very much needed boost going into the final steps before Copenhagen," said Jake Schmidt, international climate policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Chinese announcement "is a pretty strong signal that China is ready to move forward aggressively on clean energy and global warming," he added.
China's pledge was met enthusiastically by leaders in Europe and at the United Nations, where climate chief Yvo de Boer said the vows of emission reductions by China and the United States could help "unlock" an international treaty to curb climate change.
The White House also praised the move by Beijing.
"We welcome China's intention to cut the growth of their emissions by reducing the carbon intensity of their economy," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.
"Building on the president's productive talks in Beijing, the United States will continue to engage constructively with China on this and other elements of the negotiations going into Copenhagen."
Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute, noted that the two countries will need to go further in their pledges to reach the levels of commitment of some other nations.
"But the road to an international agreement is now open more than ever," he said.
Still, there were signs Thursday that negotiators still have work to do before completing even a preliminary climate deal in Copenhagen -- and that some countries, particularly those that scientists call most vulnerable to climate change, were unimpressed with this week's announcements.
A group of small island nations Thursday criticized what it called a "lack of ambition" on the part of the United States and other wealthy nations, saying the world's most developed countries must curb emissions more than they've pledged and offer billions of dollars in financial assistance to the developing world. Those island nations wield considerable power in international climate talks.
"These proposals are missing critical elements," Grenada's foreign affairs minister, Peter David, who chairs the 43-member Alliance of Small Island States, said in a statement. But he later added: "With clear, ambitious commitments and actions from the developed countries, individually and collectively, we know that we can succeed."
Schmidt, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, predicted that the negotiators would eventually rally around the "critical" engagement of the United States and China during the conference in Denmark.
In the meantime, he said, "I'm sure there'll be some grumbling in the first week, first week and a half at Copenhagen."
In making its announcement about emission cuts, the Chinese government also said Premier Wen Jiabao would attend the Copenhagen summit.
"Wen's presence at the meeting fully embodies the Chinese government's great attention to the issue and its political willingness to address the issue with international cooperation," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a news conference in Beijing.
China's State Council said that by 2020, the country would reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 40% to 45% compared with levels in 2005.
This is "a voluntary action based on our own national conditions" and "is a major contribution to the global effort in tackling climate change," the State Council said.
Although the cuts were welcomed, Greenpeace China said the targets did not go far enough, considering the Asian nation's emissions are expected to continue rising. A pledge in the 45% to 50% range would have been better, it said.
And China's gross domestic product is expected to grow, so its total emissions might not drop.
Despite this, the recent moves by China and the U.S. show a willingness to lead the globe toward a climate solution, said Yang Ailun, climate campaign manager for Greenpeace China.
"They're definitely feeling the heat from Copenhagen," Yang said. "The two big countries are setting up a good foundation. China will have to be more energy efficient, which means more renewable energy. They'll have to tackle their over-dependency on coal."
China and the U.S. have sparred over emission reduction commitments.
Beijing is reluctant to agree to any cuts that would jeopardize its economic growth and believes that developed nations, as the biggest polluters historically, should assume a larger share of overall reductions.
Washington has asserted that global warming cannot be stemmed unless China agrees to ambitious cuts. Some lawmakers are reluctant to enter binding agreements unless China and India do too, for fear it will make the U.S. less economically competitive.
On Wednesday, the White House said the U.S. would "put on the table" a commitment to reduce emissions by around 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, and 83% by 2050.
The pledge is consistent with language in a climate bill stalled in the Senate, but it is also different from the Chinese plan because it aims to lower total emissions from 2005 levels.
China's total emissions could still go up compared with 2005 because its economic output is expected to climb. However, with the new pledge, China would do so at a slower rate.
david.pierson@latimes.com
jtankersley@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
Aiding North Korea defectors: A high-stakes spy mission
A recent operation offers a peek inside the 'underground railroad,' a network of safe houses and secret border crossings that assists in the escape of North Korean refugees.
By John M. Glionna
November 25, 2009
Reporting from Seoul
As he cased the security at the foreign embassies in Hanoi, the 78-year-old retiree was seized with sudden self-doubt. He was certainly no John le Carre. Who was he to play spy?
But this wasn't a game. Waiting in nearby safe houses were nine North Korean defectors whom Kim Sang-hun had helped spirit into Vietnam from China -- among them a young doctor and his wife, a mother and daughter, and a woman who'd been sold as a sex slave in Beijing.
"I thought, 'What am I doing here? I'm not a spy. Espionage takes resources and support,' " recalled the activist, who has devoted his retirement to helping refugees escape the repressive Stalinist regime. " 'I have no training. Is the mere will to succeed enough?' "
Days earlier, Kim had received devastating news. Five other defectors, including a woman and her 6-year-old son, had been captured at the Chinese border en route to joining the other nine in Hanoi.
"They were almost there, and now they were gone, being sent back to North Korea to prison and perhaps death," he said. "I remember saying to someone, 'I wish I was dead.' "
He thought about the defectors under his care: For months, they had lived under the constant threat of being caught by Chinese officials and returned to North Korea. Now in Hanoi, the activists' goal was to find the right embassy -- one away from a busy street and out of the steely gaze of Vietnamese secret police -- and then shepherd the defectors inside.
Once within the embassy compound, the refugees could request sanctuary, taking another step toward freedom in South Korea.
The plan was all set. Then Kim and other activists learned about the capture of the five. The three activists -- Kim, another South Korean and an American missionary -- gathered to discuss their options. Should they press forward with the nine remaining defectors, or was the embassy gambit now too risky?
"We were all so tormented," Kim recalled. "At the same time we had to be reasonable. We had nine lives under our custody, people for whom we had assumed total responsibility."
The activists finally posed their dilemma to the defectors themselves. "We told them, 'This is our plan,' " Kim said. " 'Do you want to go forward? It's all up to you.' "
Operation's details
The gripping details of the September operation offer a rare peek inside the covert workings of the "underground railroad," a network of safe houses and secret border crossings that assists in the escape of North Korean refugees.
The activists spoke out to bring attention to the plight of the detained defectors. They have received conflicting reports as to whether the five were still being held in China or had been sent back to North Korea, where they could face severe punishment as an example to other would-be runaways.
At a news conference Nov. 18 near the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, they read an open letter to President Obama, who was visiting on a diplomatic swing through Asia. Protesters wanted Obama to challenge the Chinese policy of "forced repatriation" of North Korean refugees, which they say violates China's obligations under the 1951 United Nations convention on the protection of refugees.
Most defectors from North Korea steal into China across the porous border between the two nations. But their journey to freedom is far from over. In China, the women risk being sold into sex rings. Chinese secret police are always set to pounce, prepared to usher the unlucky back to North Korea. So many lie low and wait. They live in safe houses, often working illegally.
They scrape by, waiting for a chance to leave China, knowing the tap on the shoulder from Chinese authorities could come at any time.
"They're afraid of being stopped by some official, asked a question in Chinese they cannot answer," said Tim Peters, the American missionary who took part in the September operation.
"The collar could come on trains, on the street, en route between safe houses. Many North Koreans are physically shorter than Chinese. And the police can smell fear," said Peters, founder of Helping Hands Korea.
No one knows for sure how many people try to escape from North Korea each year, or how many are caught in the attempt. But they do know this: The number of escape attempts is tied to a roulette wheel of economic and political factors, including widespread famine and brutal government crackdowns.
Officials in South Korea estimate that nearly 20,000 North Koreans have relocated here since the 1950s, most within the last decade.
Documents obtained from Chinese border police three years ago suggest that officials in one province alone deported 100 people per month back to North Korea, activists say.
"But nobody knows if that is still the case," said Joanna Hosaniak, a senior program officer with the Citizens Alliance for North Korean Human Rights.
North Korea recently launched a crackdown, expanding the notorious Chongori concentration camp -- known for its brutal conditions and high death rates -- to handle defectors, the Seoul-based newspaper Chosun Ilbo reported.
Meanwhile, activists try to expand escape routes for refugees.
"It's strategically important to find new pathways," Peters said. "Not just new routes across borders, but safe houses and countries where they can be moved along the way."
Vietnam, activists charge, has recently turned a deaf ear to the plight of defectors. After South Korea's 2004 airlift of 468 refugees from its embassy in Hanoi, embarrassed Vietnamese officials have tried to mend relations with North Korea, activists allege.
The South Korean Embassy in Hanoi has also quietly refused to accept defectors since the incident, Kim says. South Korean officials declined to comment. A Vietnamese Embassy spokesman in Seoul denied that his country rejected defectors.
Activists sought a well-publicized defector case to highlight what they termed the political recalcitrance of both nations.
For months, they scoured China for the right defectors. Finally, they identified 14 refugees willing to take the risk.
A poor beginning
In Hanoi, things went wrong at the start.
The activists had chosen the Danish Embassy, a building without high fences or gates and a security guard who often became distracted while assisting visitors.
They ruled out simply storming the door, a tactic Kim has used before, deciding to sneak the defectors inside disguised as tourists.
Moments after Peters entered the lobby as a lookout, activist Peter Chung, director of the group Justice for North Korea, posed as a guide and quickly ushered the group inside.
According to the plan, Chung would then leave the embassy. To linger would risk being detained by Vietnamese officials on possible charges of human trafficking and assisting illegal immigrants.
The physician in the group was chosen to approach embassy employees behind a glass security window and present a letter expressing the group's plea for asylum.
"We are now at the point of such desperation and live in such fear of persecution within North Korea that we have come to the decision to risk our lives for freedom rather than passively await our doom," the note read in English. "The only power we have left is to appeal to you on our knees and with tears."
But suddenly, the doctor lost his nerve. Chung had to act.
"I was stressed," recalled the 42-year-old, who had been detained in China for more than a year in 2003-04 for assisting North Korean defectors.
He called South Korean Embassy officials, who promised to assist, as long as the activists did not make the incident public. Then he approached Danish officials, who he said at first refused to aid the group. Chung persisted. "These are refugees," he said. "They have a right to be protected."
Hours later, with the South Koreans a no-show, the Danish relented, demanding that Chung hand over his passport information as part of the negotiations. The Danish ambassador in Hanoi was not available to comment on the episode.
Chung then left for the airport, where he was detained by Vietnamese police and held for two weeks. No charges were filed.
After nearly a month of living in tents on the Danish Embassy grounds, the nine defectors are in South Korea. But activists still worry about the fate of the captured five.
For Kim, the episode demonstrates the roller-coaster highs and lows of his work: "You lose so much the very moment you thought you were going to achieve something great."
john.glionna@latimes.com
Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By John M. Glionna
November 25, 2009
Reporting from Seoul
As he cased the security at the foreign embassies in Hanoi, the 78-year-old retiree was seized with sudden self-doubt. He was certainly no John le Carre. Who was he to play spy?
But this wasn't a game. Waiting in nearby safe houses were nine North Korean defectors whom Kim Sang-hun had helped spirit into Vietnam from China -- among them a young doctor and his wife, a mother and daughter, and a woman who'd been sold as a sex slave in Beijing.
"I thought, 'What am I doing here? I'm not a spy. Espionage takes resources and support,' " recalled the activist, who has devoted his retirement to helping refugees escape the repressive Stalinist regime. " 'I have no training. Is the mere will to succeed enough?' "
Days earlier, Kim had received devastating news. Five other defectors, including a woman and her 6-year-old son, had been captured at the Chinese border en route to joining the other nine in Hanoi.
"They were almost there, and now they were gone, being sent back to North Korea to prison and perhaps death," he said. "I remember saying to someone, 'I wish I was dead.' "
He thought about the defectors under his care: For months, they had lived under the constant threat of being caught by Chinese officials and returned to North Korea. Now in Hanoi, the activists' goal was to find the right embassy -- one away from a busy street and out of the steely gaze of Vietnamese secret police -- and then shepherd the defectors inside.
Once within the embassy compound, the refugees could request sanctuary, taking another step toward freedom in South Korea.
The plan was all set. Then Kim and other activists learned about the capture of the five. The three activists -- Kim, another South Korean and an American missionary -- gathered to discuss their options. Should they press forward with the nine remaining defectors, or was the embassy gambit now too risky?
"We were all so tormented," Kim recalled. "At the same time we had to be reasonable. We had nine lives under our custody, people for whom we had assumed total responsibility."
The activists finally posed their dilemma to the defectors themselves. "We told them, 'This is our plan,' " Kim said. " 'Do you want to go forward? It's all up to you.' "
Operation's details
The gripping details of the September operation offer a rare peek inside the covert workings of the "underground railroad," a network of safe houses and secret border crossings that assists in the escape of North Korean refugees.
The activists spoke out to bring attention to the plight of the detained defectors. They have received conflicting reports as to whether the five were still being held in China or had been sent back to North Korea, where they could face severe punishment as an example to other would-be runaways.
At a news conference Nov. 18 near the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, they read an open letter to President Obama, who was visiting on a diplomatic swing through Asia. Protesters wanted Obama to challenge the Chinese policy of "forced repatriation" of North Korean refugees, which they say violates China's obligations under the 1951 United Nations convention on the protection of refugees.
Most defectors from North Korea steal into China across the porous border between the two nations. But their journey to freedom is far from over. In China, the women risk being sold into sex rings. Chinese secret police are always set to pounce, prepared to usher the unlucky back to North Korea. So many lie low and wait. They live in safe houses, often working illegally.
They scrape by, waiting for a chance to leave China, knowing the tap on the shoulder from Chinese authorities could come at any time.
"They're afraid of being stopped by some official, asked a question in Chinese they cannot answer," said Tim Peters, the American missionary who took part in the September operation.
"The collar could come on trains, on the street, en route between safe houses. Many North Koreans are physically shorter than Chinese. And the police can smell fear," said Peters, founder of Helping Hands Korea.
No one knows for sure how many people try to escape from North Korea each year, or how many are caught in the attempt. But they do know this: The number of escape attempts is tied to a roulette wheel of economic and political factors, including widespread famine and brutal government crackdowns.
Officials in South Korea estimate that nearly 20,000 North Koreans have relocated here since the 1950s, most within the last decade.
Documents obtained from Chinese border police three years ago suggest that officials in one province alone deported 100 people per month back to North Korea, activists say.
"But nobody knows if that is still the case," said Joanna Hosaniak, a senior program officer with the Citizens Alliance for North Korean Human Rights.
North Korea recently launched a crackdown, expanding the notorious Chongori concentration camp -- known for its brutal conditions and high death rates -- to handle defectors, the Seoul-based newspaper Chosun Ilbo reported.
Meanwhile, activists try to expand escape routes for refugees.
"It's strategically important to find new pathways," Peters said. "Not just new routes across borders, but safe houses and countries where they can be moved along the way."
Vietnam, activists charge, has recently turned a deaf ear to the plight of defectors. After South Korea's 2004 airlift of 468 refugees from its embassy in Hanoi, embarrassed Vietnamese officials have tried to mend relations with North Korea, activists allege.
The South Korean Embassy in Hanoi has also quietly refused to accept defectors since the incident, Kim says. South Korean officials declined to comment. A Vietnamese Embassy spokesman in Seoul denied that his country rejected defectors.
Activists sought a well-publicized defector case to highlight what they termed the political recalcitrance of both nations.
For months, they scoured China for the right defectors. Finally, they identified 14 refugees willing to take the risk.
A poor beginning
In Hanoi, things went wrong at the start.
The activists had chosen the Danish Embassy, a building without high fences or gates and a security guard who often became distracted while assisting visitors.
They ruled out simply storming the door, a tactic Kim has used before, deciding to sneak the defectors inside disguised as tourists.
Moments after Peters entered the lobby as a lookout, activist Peter Chung, director of the group Justice for North Korea, posed as a guide and quickly ushered the group inside.
According to the plan, Chung would then leave the embassy. To linger would risk being detained by Vietnamese officials on possible charges of human trafficking and assisting illegal immigrants.
The physician in the group was chosen to approach embassy employees behind a glass security window and present a letter expressing the group's plea for asylum.
"We are now at the point of such desperation and live in such fear of persecution within North Korea that we have come to the decision to risk our lives for freedom rather than passively await our doom," the note read in English. "The only power we have left is to appeal to you on our knees and with tears."
But suddenly, the doctor lost his nerve. Chung had to act.
"I was stressed," recalled the 42-year-old, who had been detained in China for more than a year in 2003-04 for assisting North Korean defectors.
He called South Korean Embassy officials, who promised to assist, as long as the activists did not make the incident public. Then he approached Danish officials, who he said at first refused to aid the group. Chung persisted. "These are refugees," he said. "They have a right to be protected."
Hours later, with the South Koreans a no-show, the Danish relented, demanding that Chung hand over his passport information as part of the negotiations. The Danish ambassador in Hanoi was not available to comment on the episode.
Chung then left for the airport, where he was detained by Vietnamese police and held for two weeks. No charges were filed.
After nearly a month of living in tents on the Danish Embassy grounds, the nine defectors are in South Korea. But activists still worry about the fate of the captured five.
For Kim, the episode demonstrates the roller-coaster highs and lows of his work: "You lose so much the very moment you thought you were going to achieve something great."
john.glionna@latimes.com
Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
China sentences activist to 3 years
Huang Qi was investigating the role shoddy school construction may have played in the deaths of thousands of children in the Sichuan quake last year.
By Barbara Demick
November 24, 2009
Reporting from Beijing
An activist who was investigating the role shoddy school construction played in the deaths of more than 5,000 children in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake was given a three-year prison sentence Monday on charges of possessing state secrets.
Huang Qi, 46, a veteran activist and blogger, is the most prominent of more than a dozen people who were arrested for demanding investigations into construction standards after the magnitude 7.9 temblor. Others included prominent artists, former teachers and parents who lost their only children in the earthquake.
Huang is a veteran activist who had long irritated Chinese authorities by writing about taboo subjects, such as the 1989 crackdown at Tiananmen Square and the persecution of practitioners of the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement. He'd previously served time in prison.
After the May 12 earthquake, Huang rented a truck and distributed water and instant noodles to people left homeless. He also organized bereaved parents who were questioning why so many schools collapsed when Communist Party and government buildings nearby remained intact. He was arrested less than a month after the quake -- a week after posting an article on his website about school construction standards.
Huang's wife, Zeng Li, told reporters Monday in the Sichuan capital, Chengdu, where the sentencing took place, that her husband was convicted of illegal possession of municipal documents, but that she wasn't told what the papers were or even which municipality they were from.
U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman Jr. spoke to Chinese officials about Huang's case during the run-up to President Obama's visit to China last week, according to embassy spokeswoman Susan Stevenson. It was unclear whether the president himself brought up the subject.
Some Chinese human rights activists have criticized Obama for not being more forceful on their behalf.
"Since the beginning of the financial crisis, the world has been intimidated by China, whether it is about economics, culture or human rights. This is a sad situation that I saw during Obama's visit," said Yang Licai, who volunteered to tally the number of children killed in collapsing schools. Yang said that he and others involved with the quake "were merely people with a conscience trying to find out the truth of what happened and help China avoid the same mistakes."
Amnesty International said in a statement Monday that the Chinese government prohibited witnesses from testifying at Huang's trial and restricted his access to a lawyer under the grounds that "state secrets" were involved.
"China's state secrets legislation needs to urgently be reviewed. These laws are used extensively to retroactively penalize lawful human rights activities and restrict freedom of expression," said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific director.
barbara.demick@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By Barbara Demick
November 24, 2009
Reporting from Beijing
An activist who was investigating the role shoddy school construction played in the deaths of more than 5,000 children in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake was given a three-year prison sentence Monday on charges of possessing state secrets.
Huang Qi, 46, a veteran activist and blogger, is the most prominent of more than a dozen people who were arrested for demanding investigations into construction standards after the magnitude 7.9 temblor. Others included prominent artists, former teachers and parents who lost their only children in the earthquake.
Huang is a veteran activist who had long irritated Chinese authorities by writing about taboo subjects, such as the 1989 crackdown at Tiananmen Square and the persecution of practitioners of the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement. He'd previously served time in prison.
After the May 12 earthquake, Huang rented a truck and distributed water and instant noodles to people left homeless. He also organized bereaved parents who were questioning why so many schools collapsed when Communist Party and government buildings nearby remained intact. He was arrested less than a month after the quake -- a week after posting an article on his website about school construction standards.
Huang's wife, Zeng Li, told reporters Monday in the Sichuan capital, Chengdu, where the sentencing took place, that her husband was convicted of illegal possession of municipal documents, but that she wasn't told what the papers were or even which municipality they were from.
U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman Jr. spoke to Chinese officials about Huang's case during the run-up to President Obama's visit to China last week, according to embassy spokeswoman Susan Stevenson. It was unclear whether the president himself brought up the subject.
Some Chinese human rights activists have criticized Obama for not being more forceful on their behalf.
"Since the beginning of the financial crisis, the world has been intimidated by China, whether it is about economics, culture or human rights. This is a sad situation that I saw during Obama's visit," said Yang Licai, who volunteered to tally the number of children killed in collapsing schools. Yang said that he and others involved with the quake "were merely people with a conscience trying to find out the truth of what happened and help China avoid the same mistakes."
Amnesty International said in a statement Monday that the Chinese government prohibited witnesses from testifying at Huang's trial and restricted his access to a lawyer under the grounds that "state secrets" were involved.
"China's state secrets legislation needs to urgently be reviewed. These laws are used extensively to retroactively penalize lawful human rights activities and restrict freedom of expression," said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific director.
barbara.demick@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
U.S.-South Korea free-trade pact stalls over politics
The U.S. could use a boost in exports, some analysts say, but a deal with South Korea isn't likely any time soon.
By Don Lee
November 28, 2009
Reporting from Washington
At a time when the United States desperately needs to boost exports and create jobs, America's free-trade pact with South Korea offers the promise of doing both, say many analysts and businesses especially on the West Coast.
But the long-stalled agreement isn't likely to get ratified any time soon -- despite renewed hopes from President Obama's trip to Asia this month and the threat that South Korea's pending trade deal with the European Union could soon put U.S. exporters at a competitive disadvantage.
In Seoul, Obama pledged to move the U.S.-South Korea agreement forward, but he offered no timetable for when that might happen. And although South Korean President Lee Myung-bak expressed a willingness to reopen talks on granting the U.S. wider access to his country's auto market, a crucial sticking point, Korean officials have since backed away. "We are not going to offer anything to the U.S. side," said a South Korean Embassy official in Washington.
Strong opposition to the accord in the U.S. has come from organized labor. AFL-CIO policy director Thea Lee contends that the deal will end up costing American jobs and that there aren't enough protections for South Korean workers' rights. Ford Motor Co. has been a vocal critic as well. But what's really holding up the agreement is politics.
In Michigan, Ohio and other big industrial states, politicians face a strong backlash against trade accords that are seen as symbols of the problems afflicting the U.S. manufacturing sector. For Obama, it's all the more difficult to push harder on the South Korea agreement given his tough talk on trade during the campaign trail -- he promised to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement -- and the risks of alienating labor unions and Democratic lawmakers while he has unfinished business trying to overhaul healthcare.
Obama has come under fire from abroad and at home for protectionist moves such as slapping heavy tariffs on cheap Chinese tires, even though trade has not been a major part of his agenda in his first year as president. Besides the South Korea trade accord, which was signed in June 2007, similar pacts with Panama and Colombia have languished as well.
At the same time, Obama administration officials have repeatedly stated that the president wants to build a more export-oriented economy in the wake of the financial crisis, and a senior aide said Obama's trip to Asia was aimed in good part at doing just that.
But Obama faces an uphill challenge within his own party.
"I don't know why the president would want to continue [George W.] Bush's trade policy," said Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), calling for a fresh start on South Korea-U.S. trade talks.
"Look at what's happened with the numbers," he said, referring to America's persistently large trade deficit, which was running at $360 billion through September of this year. "Our trade policy hasn't worked, and we ought to try something else."
South Korea is the United States' seventh-largest trading partner, with Americans importing $48.1 billion and exporting $34.7 billion to South Korea last year. That amounted to a $13.4-billion shortfall.
The agreement would probably boost U.S. exports to South Korea by $10 billion to $11 billion, particularly of farm goods, machinery and electronics; Korean shipments of textiles, shoes and possibly cars, among other products, would increase by $6 billion to $7 billion, according to projections by the U.S. International Trade Commission.
U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk calls the ITC analysis "the gold standard for weighing the economic benefits and costs of an agreement." Yet Kirk also told the U.S.-Korea Business Council this month that the administration was undertaking a fresh review of the pact and gathering public comments, even though the nearly 400-page ITC report contained views from dozens of parties in varying industries.
The report foresees small job gains in the meat industry and some other sectors, while losses are expected to be negligible, in part because South Korea's import growth would probably displace shipments from other foreign suppliers.
On cars, Kirk said: "Our market is open to Korean autos. All we are asking for is for our own auto companies to be able to compete on a level playing field in the Korean market."
General Motors Co., Ford and Chrysler shipped about 7,000 vehicles to South Korea last year, a little more than 1% of the number of cars that Hyundai Motor Co. and Kia Motors Corp. sent to the U.S. That difference accounts for most of the U.S. trade gap with South Korea.
South Korea's car market has a legacy of being closed, but the agreement would require Seoul to drop its 8% auto tariff immediately. Meanwhile, the 2.5% duty on small-engine Korean cars to the U.S. would disappear right away, and the 25% levy on pickup trucks would phase out over 10 years.
Critics said the accord didn't adequately address South Korea's nontariff barriers. But many doubt that American automakers could make big gains anyway. U.S. car brands don't rate highly among Korean consumers. Under similar market conditions, Japanese cars outsell American models in South Korea by 3 to 1, and German automakers have a nearly 4-to-1 edge over U.S. rivals.
"It's a bit exaggerated to say the U.S. could export a lot of cars even if the market was completely open and you had no restriction," said Jeffrey Schott, a trade policy expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.
Similarly, he doesn't see the elimination of the 2.5% tariff in the U.S. as making a whole lot of difference for Korean automakers. Hyundai and Kia have a combined market share in the U.S. of about 7% through October of this year.
"Overall, the U.S. economy is a big winner from the U.S.-Korea trade agreement," Schott said, although he warned that time was running out. He expects the South Korea-EU pact to take effect next year, and "there would be trade diversion."
Joseph Rollo, head of the international department at the Wine Institute in San Francisco, remembers how California's share of South Korea's wine market slipped after Seoul struck a free-trade deal with Chile a few years ago. It's almost certain to fall further once the 15% tariff on foreign wines is lifted for Europe, he said.
"We would like to see it get through," Rollo said of the South Korea-U.S. agreement. But after more than two years in limbo, he said, he isn't holding his breath.
don.lee@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By Don Lee
November 28, 2009
Reporting from Washington
At a time when the United States desperately needs to boost exports and create jobs, America's free-trade pact with South Korea offers the promise of doing both, say many analysts and businesses especially on the West Coast.
But the long-stalled agreement isn't likely to get ratified any time soon -- despite renewed hopes from President Obama's trip to Asia this month and the threat that South Korea's pending trade deal with the European Union could soon put U.S. exporters at a competitive disadvantage.
In Seoul, Obama pledged to move the U.S.-South Korea agreement forward, but he offered no timetable for when that might happen. And although South Korean President Lee Myung-bak expressed a willingness to reopen talks on granting the U.S. wider access to his country's auto market, a crucial sticking point, Korean officials have since backed away. "We are not going to offer anything to the U.S. side," said a South Korean Embassy official in Washington.
Strong opposition to the accord in the U.S. has come from organized labor. AFL-CIO policy director Thea Lee contends that the deal will end up costing American jobs and that there aren't enough protections for South Korean workers' rights. Ford Motor Co. has been a vocal critic as well. But what's really holding up the agreement is politics.
In Michigan, Ohio and other big industrial states, politicians face a strong backlash against trade accords that are seen as symbols of the problems afflicting the U.S. manufacturing sector. For Obama, it's all the more difficult to push harder on the South Korea agreement given his tough talk on trade during the campaign trail -- he promised to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement -- and the risks of alienating labor unions and Democratic lawmakers while he has unfinished business trying to overhaul healthcare.
Obama has come under fire from abroad and at home for protectionist moves such as slapping heavy tariffs on cheap Chinese tires, even though trade has not been a major part of his agenda in his first year as president. Besides the South Korea trade accord, which was signed in June 2007, similar pacts with Panama and Colombia have languished as well.
At the same time, Obama administration officials have repeatedly stated that the president wants to build a more export-oriented economy in the wake of the financial crisis, and a senior aide said Obama's trip to Asia was aimed in good part at doing just that.
But Obama faces an uphill challenge within his own party.
"I don't know why the president would want to continue [George W.] Bush's trade policy," said Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), calling for a fresh start on South Korea-U.S. trade talks.
"Look at what's happened with the numbers," he said, referring to America's persistently large trade deficit, which was running at $360 billion through September of this year. "Our trade policy hasn't worked, and we ought to try something else."
South Korea is the United States' seventh-largest trading partner, with Americans importing $48.1 billion and exporting $34.7 billion to South Korea last year. That amounted to a $13.4-billion shortfall.
The agreement would probably boost U.S. exports to South Korea by $10 billion to $11 billion, particularly of farm goods, machinery and electronics; Korean shipments of textiles, shoes and possibly cars, among other products, would increase by $6 billion to $7 billion, according to projections by the U.S. International Trade Commission.
U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk calls the ITC analysis "the gold standard for weighing the economic benefits and costs of an agreement." Yet Kirk also told the U.S.-Korea Business Council this month that the administration was undertaking a fresh review of the pact and gathering public comments, even though the nearly 400-page ITC report contained views from dozens of parties in varying industries.
The report foresees small job gains in the meat industry and some other sectors, while losses are expected to be negligible, in part because South Korea's import growth would probably displace shipments from other foreign suppliers.
On cars, Kirk said: "Our market is open to Korean autos. All we are asking for is for our own auto companies to be able to compete on a level playing field in the Korean market."
General Motors Co., Ford and Chrysler shipped about 7,000 vehicles to South Korea last year, a little more than 1% of the number of cars that Hyundai Motor Co. and Kia Motors Corp. sent to the U.S. That difference accounts for most of the U.S. trade gap with South Korea.
South Korea's car market has a legacy of being closed, but the agreement would require Seoul to drop its 8% auto tariff immediately. Meanwhile, the 2.5% duty on small-engine Korean cars to the U.S. would disappear right away, and the 25% levy on pickup trucks would phase out over 10 years.
Critics said the accord didn't adequately address South Korea's nontariff barriers. But many doubt that American automakers could make big gains anyway. U.S. car brands don't rate highly among Korean consumers. Under similar market conditions, Japanese cars outsell American models in South Korea by 3 to 1, and German automakers have a nearly 4-to-1 edge over U.S. rivals.
"It's a bit exaggerated to say the U.S. could export a lot of cars even if the market was completely open and you had no restriction," said Jeffrey Schott, a trade policy expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.
Similarly, he doesn't see the elimination of the 2.5% tariff in the U.S. as making a whole lot of difference for Korean automakers. Hyundai and Kia have a combined market share in the U.S. of about 7% through October of this year.
"Overall, the U.S. economy is a big winner from the U.S.-Korea trade agreement," Schott said, although he warned that time was running out. He expects the South Korea-EU pact to take effect next year, and "there would be trade diversion."
Joseph Rollo, head of the international department at the Wine Institute in San Francisco, remembers how California's share of South Korea's wine market slipped after Seoul struck a free-trade deal with Chile a few years ago. It's almost certain to fall further once the 15% tariff on foreign wines is lifted for Europe, he said.
"We would like to see it get through," Rollo said of the South Korea-U.S. agreement. But after more than two years in limbo, he said, he isn't holding his breath.
don.lee@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
Manga's story starts with kamishibai
Part street theater and paper artistry, the Japanese art form would go on to influence modern-day comics. In 'Manga Kamishibai,' writer Eric P. Nash unveils its little-known history.
By Liesl Bradner
November 29, 2009
It was the simple clacking of two wooden sticks on a street corner that signaled to children the start of kamishibai, a popular pastime during Depression-era Japan. Kamishibai means "street theater using painted illustrations." Author Eric P. Nash examines the little-known art form and predecessor to modern-day anime and manga in his recent book "Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper Theater," published by Abrams ComicArts.
Storytellers would travel from town to town with their butai (miniature stage) on the back of a bike. The set-up was reminiscent of a "Punch and Judy" show, but instead of puppets the narrator would slide a series of poster boards with water color illustrations in and out of the box. He would act out the script, which was written on cards placed on the back of a board.
Each show consisted of three stories of about 10 minutes each: an adventure for boys, a domestic drama for girls and then a simple comic story. The majority of performances ended in a cliffhanger, forcing eager audiences to return the next day.
Nash, a New York Times writer and research editor and author of several books on architecture, has always been a fan of comics. It was while reading the book "Getting it Wrong in Japan" that he came across "kamishibai," a word he had never seen before, and decided to dig further. Unable to find any book on the topic in English, he traveled to Japan two years ago to investigate and found more than 300 images in two children's libraries in Osaka and Tokyo and discovered countless contributions that kamishibai had made to the comics genre.
"A lot of attributes seen in anime are present," Nash said, "such as Giant Robots and monsters from outer space." He also mentions the "manga-sized eyes," wide and oversized, meant to convey emotion found in popular characters such as Jungle Boy.
Golden Bat, created in 1931, was considered to be the world's first true comic superhero. Although visually resembling Captain America's nemesis Red Skull, Golden Bat and Superman share more commonalities: the red cape, skill of flight, superhuman strength and a fortress of solitude, albeit in the Japanese Alps.
Kamishibai artists departed from traditional Japanese line art drawing by creating a cartoon-like style and applying chiaroscuro, the Western style of contrasting light and dark, providing depth and mass.
During World War II, the Japanese government used kamishibai for propaganda, as did Americans during the occupation with stories centered on democratic values such as baseball.
The demise of kamishibai coincided with the end of the occupation and introduction of television in 1952.
Many of the form's writers and artists then migrated into manga in the '50s such as Astro Boy creator Osamu Tezuka.
In "Manga Kamishibai," Golden Bat creator Takeo Nagamatsu summed up his feelings on kamishibai's role in Japanese society: "Pictures that look nice in someone's house are great . . . but kamishibai are loved by many children and cheer them up. When I think of these children later growing up to be honorable Japanese adults, it makes me realize the significance of creating kamishibai."
liesl.bradner@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By Liesl Bradner
November 29, 2009
It was the simple clacking of two wooden sticks on a street corner that signaled to children the start of kamishibai, a popular pastime during Depression-era Japan. Kamishibai means "street theater using painted illustrations." Author Eric P. Nash examines the little-known art form and predecessor to modern-day anime and manga in his recent book "Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper Theater," published by Abrams ComicArts.
Storytellers would travel from town to town with their butai (miniature stage) on the back of a bike. The set-up was reminiscent of a "Punch and Judy" show, but instead of puppets the narrator would slide a series of poster boards with water color illustrations in and out of the box. He would act out the script, which was written on cards placed on the back of a board.
Each show consisted of three stories of about 10 minutes each: an adventure for boys, a domestic drama for girls and then a simple comic story. The majority of performances ended in a cliffhanger, forcing eager audiences to return the next day.
Nash, a New York Times writer and research editor and author of several books on architecture, has always been a fan of comics. It was while reading the book "Getting it Wrong in Japan" that he came across "kamishibai," a word he had never seen before, and decided to dig further. Unable to find any book on the topic in English, he traveled to Japan two years ago to investigate and found more than 300 images in two children's libraries in Osaka and Tokyo and discovered countless contributions that kamishibai had made to the comics genre.
"A lot of attributes seen in anime are present," Nash said, "such as Giant Robots and monsters from outer space." He also mentions the "manga-sized eyes," wide and oversized, meant to convey emotion found in popular characters such as Jungle Boy.
Golden Bat, created in 1931, was considered to be the world's first true comic superhero. Although visually resembling Captain America's nemesis Red Skull, Golden Bat and Superman share more commonalities: the red cape, skill of flight, superhuman strength and a fortress of solitude, albeit in the Japanese Alps.
Kamishibai artists departed from traditional Japanese line art drawing by creating a cartoon-like style and applying chiaroscuro, the Western style of contrasting light and dark, providing depth and mass.
During World War II, the Japanese government used kamishibai for propaganda, as did Americans during the occupation with stories centered on democratic values such as baseball.
The demise of kamishibai coincided with the end of the occupation and introduction of television in 1952.
Many of the form's writers and artists then migrated into manga in the '50s such as Astro Boy creator Osamu Tezuka.
In "Manga Kamishibai," Golden Bat creator Takeo Nagamatsu summed up his feelings on kamishibai's role in Japanese society: "Pictures that look nice in someone's house are great . . . but kamishibai are loved by many children and cheer them up. When I think of these children later growing up to be honorable Japanese adults, it makes me realize the significance of creating kamishibai."
liesl.bradner@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
In South Korea, abortion foes gain ground
Though they're technically illegal, abortions are prevalent and rarely discussed in the political sphere. One doctor has become the face of a movement to change that.
By John M. Glionna
November 29, 2009
Reporting from Seoul
For nearly two decades, obstetrician Shim Sang-duk aborted as many babies as he delivered -- on average, one a day, month after month.
"Over time, I became emotionless," the physician said. "I came to see the results of my work as just a chunk of blood. During the operation, I felt the same as though I was treating scars or curing diseases."
Shim, 42, eventually came to despise himself, despite the money he earned from the procedures. So, two months ago, he founded an activist group of physicians who refuse to perform abortions and advocate prosecution for doctors who continue to do so.
The group's stand has brought a tidal wave of criticism from the Korean Assn. of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which represents more than 4,000 physicians in this country where abortions, although technically illegal, are so prevalent it has been tagged as "the Abortion Republic."
Unlike in America, where doctors have been threatened and even killed for performing abortions, Shim says he's received death threats for deciding to stop performing them.
The controversy illustrates the stark differences between South Korea's attitude toward abortion and that of many Western nations. While often couched elsewhere as a battle between religious activists and those defending a woman's right to choose, the issue here carries no such emotional freight.
"Western societies see abortion as one of benchmark battles between conservatives and liberals -- while here there has not been even any academic discussion," said Lee Na-young, a sociology professor at Seoul's Chung-Ang University.
In South Korea, religious groups and women's rights advocates have remained largely silent on the issue, analysts say.
"During church sermons, we barely talk about abortion, which is considered an individual matter," said Hwang Pil-gyu, a minister on the life and ethics committee of the National Council of Churches in Korea. "Many churches have put this issue on the back burner."
Shim has critics even outside the medical field. Some say he's grandstanding. Others criticize his emphasis on the financial incentive of performing abortions.
"The whole discussion seems to be about his giving up profits from the abortions he doesn't do," Lee said. "This isn't the issue."
But Shim's campaign has triggered a rare public debate on abortion. Lawmakers now call for tougher enforcement of existing laws, and are asking parents to reassess the cultural value of childbirth.
Beginning in the 1970s, officials advocated fewer births as a way to fuel economic productivity. The policy was perhaps too successful: Birthrates in South Korea plummeted. A decade ago, officials reversed their stand, calling for residents to have more babies.
Yet the declining fertility trend has proved difficult to reverse. The country's birthrate is now among the lowest worldwide, with just 1.19 live births per woman.
Meanwhile, abortion rates have kept their pace, many say. Every year, 450,000 babies are born here; Health Ministry officials estimate that 350,000 abortions are performed each year. One politician says the number of abortions is actually four times higher -- nearly 1.5 million.
Now there are calls to strengthen a 1973 mother-child protection law, long criticized for containing loopholes and for being rarely enforced. Some lawmakers want to prosecute more physicians for performing abortions and close down underground clinics where the procedures cost as little as $70.
For the first six months of 2009, only three of 29 abortion-related cases were prosecuted, said Chang Yoon-seok, a member of the ruling Grand National Party, who supports tougher sanctions.
"Even though illegal abortions are widespread . . . it is true that everyone keeps quiet and does not say anything about it," the politician said in a statement.
Dressed in his white lab coat, the bespectacled Shim embodies a new public consciousness against abortion.
In the lobby of his Ion clinic, a sign explains his new philosophy. "Abortions, which abandon the valuable life of a fetus, are the very misery for the nation and society as well as pregnant women, families and ob-gyn doctors," it reads.
For years, Shim rarely, if ever, even used the word "abortion." Rather, he said, he sought to "erase" or "prevent" the fetus.
"I bought into the government's argument that it was OK to do this," he said. "It was good for the country. It boosted the economy."
Still, Shim was often baffled by his patients' behavior: After receiving their abortions, he said, most women cried.
"Many patients cry when they give birth," he said, "but these were a different kind of tears."
Although Shim's clinic made one-quarter of its profits from performing abortions, he tried harder to dissuade patients from choosing the option.
He started a website where he was contacted by other physicians. Although he claims support from 700 doctors, he acknowledges that only 30 have stopped performing the procedure.
Many others have withdrawn their support under pressure from peers. But for Shim, the benefits were immediate. "I feel like a young doctor again," he said.
The decision was difficult financially. His clinic has lost so many patients that Shim says he may soon be forced to close.
But Shim won't reconsider. The physician recalled his final abortion.
He had already sworn off the procedure when a longtime patient called him, distraught. He met with the mother of two for hours and begged her to go home and reconsider.
The following morning, she still wanted the abortion. So Shim relented. After the procedure, he said, she cried.
john.glionna@latimes.com
Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By John M. Glionna
November 29, 2009
Reporting from Seoul
For nearly two decades, obstetrician Shim Sang-duk aborted as many babies as he delivered -- on average, one a day, month after month.
"Over time, I became emotionless," the physician said. "I came to see the results of my work as just a chunk of blood. During the operation, I felt the same as though I was treating scars or curing diseases."
Shim, 42, eventually came to despise himself, despite the money he earned from the procedures. So, two months ago, he founded an activist group of physicians who refuse to perform abortions and advocate prosecution for doctors who continue to do so.
The group's stand has brought a tidal wave of criticism from the Korean Assn. of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which represents more than 4,000 physicians in this country where abortions, although technically illegal, are so prevalent it has been tagged as "the Abortion Republic."
Unlike in America, where doctors have been threatened and even killed for performing abortions, Shim says he's received death threats for deciding to stop performing them.
The controversy illustrates the stark differences between South Korea's attitude toward abortion and that of many Western nations. While often couched elsewhere as a battle between religious activists and those defending a woman's right to choose, the issue here carries no such emotional freight.
"Western societies see abortion as one of benchmark battles between conservatives and liberals -- while here there has not been even any academic discussion," said Lee Na-young, a sociology professor at Seoul's Chung-Ang University.
In South Korea, religious groups and women's rights advocates have remained largely silent on the issue, analysts say.
"During church sermons, we barely talk about abortion, which is considered an individual matter," said Hwang Pil-gyu, a minister on the life and ethics committee of the National Council of Churches in Korea. "Many churches have put this issue on the back burner."
Shim has critics even outside the medical field. Some say he's grandstanding. Others criticize his emphasis on the financial incentive of performing abortions.
"The whole discussion seems to be about his giving up profits from the abortions he doesn't do," Lee said. "This isn't the issue."
But Shim's campaign has triggered a rare public debate on abortion. Lawmakers now call for tougher enforcement of existing laws, and are asking parents to reassess the cultural value of childbirth.
Beginning in the 1970s, officials advocated fewer births as a way to fuel economic productivity. The policy was perhaps too successful: Birthrates in South Korea plummeted. A decade ago, officials reversed their stand, calling for residents to have more babies.
Yet the declining fertility trend has proved difficult to reverse. The country's birthrate is now among the lowest worldwide, with just 1.19 live births per woman.
Meanwhile, abortion rates have kept their pace, many say. Every year, 450,000 babies are born here; Health Ministry officials estimate that 350,000 abortions are performed each year. One politician says the number of abortions is actually four times higher -- nearly 1.5 million.
Now there are calls to strengthen a 1973 mother-child protection law, long criticized for containing loopholes and for being rarely enforced. Some lawmakers want to prosecute more physicians for performing abortions and close down underground clinics where the procedures cost as little as $70.
For the first six months of 2009, only three of 29 abortion-related cases were prosecuted, said Chang Yoon-seok, a member of the ruling Grand National Party, who supports tougher sanctions.
"Even though illegal abortions are widespread . . . it is true that everyone keeps quiet and does not say anything about it," the politician said in a statement.
Dressed in his white lab coat, the bespectacled Shim embodies a new public consciousness against abortion.
In the lobby of his Ion clinic, a sign explains his new philosophy. "Abortions, which abandon the valuable life of a fetus, are the very misery for the nation and society as well as pregnant women, families and ob-gyn doctors," it reads.
For years, Shim rarely, if ever, even used the word "abortion." Rather, he said, he sought to "erase" or "prevent" the fetus.
"I bought into the government's argument that it was OK to do this," he said. "It was good for the country. It boosted the economy."
Still, Shim was often baffled by his patients' behavior: After receiving their abortions, he said, most women cried.
"Many patients cry when they give birth," he said, "but these were a different kind of tears."
Although Shim's clinic made one-quarter of its profits from performing abortions, he tried harder to dissuade patients from choosing the option.
He started a website where he was contacted by other physicians. Although he claims support from 700 doctors, he acknowledges that only 30 have stopped performing the procedure.
Many others have withdrawn their support under pressure from peers. But for Shim, the benefits were immediate. "I feel like a young doctor again," he said.
The decision was difficult financially. His clinic has lost so many patients that Shim says he may soon be forced to close.
But Shim won't reconsider. The physician recalled his final abortion.
He had already sworn off the procedure when a longtime patient called him, distraught. He met with the mother of two for hours and begged her to go home and reconsider.
The following morning, she still wanted the abortion. So Shim relented. After the procedure, he said, she cried.
john.glionna@latimes.com
Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
Japan PM 'surprised' at reports of dubious funds from mother
(AFP) – 5 days ago
TOKYO — Japan's Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said Wednesday he was "surprised" about media reports that his millionaire mother gave him dubious political donations.
"I am very much surprised at what has been reported," he told reporters, as a scandal involving his fund-raising body appeared to widen about two months into his premiership.
"What has been done without my knowledge at all? Is it (what has been reported) true or not? They (the reports) have all surprised me very much," he said.
Hatoyama's fund-raising body allegedly received hundreds of thousands of dollars from his mother Yasuko, the eldest daughter of Bridgestone founder Shojiro Ishibashi, the Mainichi Shimbun said, quoting unnamed sources.
The Yomiuri Shimbun daily also said Yasuko, a major shareholder of the Japanese tyremaker, secretly provided 1.5 million yen (17,000 dollars) a year to the fund-raising body, which, if correct, may violate the political funds law.
The prime minister said he hoped that the "truth will be brought to light" through ongoing investigations by public prosecutors.
In a related development, a former aide to Hatoyama is now facing indictment for misreporting political donations, media reports said Tuesday.
Hatoyama fired the aide in June, when he was still opposition leader, and admitted to sloppy account-keeping by the fund-raising body, which had listed the names of dead people as well as people who later denied giving money.
The centre-left prime minister hails from a wealthy political family often dubbed "Japan's Kennedys" and has also faced media accusations he used his personal fortune to bankroll some of his political activities.
Hatoyama took power in mid-September after a landslide election win that ended more than half a century of almost unbroken conservative rule.
Support for his cabinet has dropped to 63 percent amid a probe into the donation scandal, the Yomiuri Shimbun said in its poll in mid-November.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano told reporters: "Our prime minister has apologised to the people. He is looking at the developments based on the assumption that he will cooperate in the investigation."
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved.
TOKYO — Japan's Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said Wednesday he was "surprised" about media reports that his millionaire mother gave him dubious political donations.
"I am very much surprised at what has been reported," he told reporters, as a scandal involving his fund-raising body appeared to widen about two months into his premiership.
"What has been done without my knowledge at all? Is it (what has been reported) true or not? They (the reports) have all surprised me very much," he said.
Hatoyama's fund-raising body allegedly received hundreds of thousands of dollars from his mother Yasuko, the eldest daughter of Bridgestone founder Shojiro Ishibashi, the Mainichi Shimbun said, quoting unnamed sources.
The Yomiuri Shimbun daily also said Yasuko, a major shareholder of the Japanese tyremaker, secretly provided 1.5 million yen (17,000 dollars) a year to the fund-raising body, which, if correct, may violate the political funds law.
The prime minister said he hoped that the "truth will be brought to light" through ongoing investigations by public prosecutors.
In a related development, a former aide to Hatoyama is now facing indictment for misreporting political donations, media reports said Tuesday.
Hatoyama fired the aide in June, when he was still opposition leader, and admitted to sloppy account-keeping by the fund-raising body, which had listed the names of dead people as well as people who later denied giving money.
The centre-left prime minister hails from a wealthy political family often dubbed "Japan's Kennedys" and has also faced media accusations he used his personal fortune to bankroll some of his political activities.
Hatoyama took power in mid-September after a landslide election win that ended more than half a century of almost unbroken conservative rule.
Support for his cabinet has dropped to 63 percent amid a probe into the donation scandal, the Yomiuri Shimbun said in its poll in mid-November.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano told reporters: "Our prime minister has apologised to the people. He is looking at the developments based on the assumption that he will cooperate in the investigation."
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved.
Japan seeks baby boom to defuse population timebomb
by Patrice Novotny Patrice Novotny
Thu Nov 26, 3:52 pm ET
TOKYO (AFP) – There are many reasons Japan's population is headed for a sharp decline, but one of them is that for working women giving birth usually spells the death of their careers.
The country's new centre-left government -- trying to defuse a ticking demographic timebomb -- is working to change laws and mindsets in a bid to boost Japan's birth rate, one of the world's lowest.
It is up against entrenched attitudes about women in the workplace and motherhood, as one twenty-something mother-to-be experienced when her employer recently handed her a pre-written resignation letter.
"The personnel department just gave me the letter," she recalled. "I was told to copy it by hand, sign it and date it. When I didn't do it immediately, the supervisor yelled at me."
"I finally gave in," said the woman, who worked at a big publishing house and asked not to be named. "In the end I was almost relieved to stop work, because the atmosphere in the office had just become so stifling."
Such cases are especially frequent for temporary workers such as the Tokyo woman, who said she had received no unemployment benefits since her 'voluntary resignation' when her boss showed her the door several months ago.
Japan's new government, which ended half a century of almost unbroken conservative rule when it took power in September, has embarked on a campaign to make Japan a more equal and family-friendly nation.
The problem is existential for Japan, the world's number two economy. Its population of about 127 million, on current trends, is projected to decline to 95 million by 2050.
That would leave the country with a ratio of only 1.5 economically active people per retiree by 2050 -- compared to about three workers per retiree now.
Japan, famously reluctant to open up its doors to more than a trickle of immigrants, is in part banking on advances in robotics to care for its army of elderly in future.
The fertility rate, the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime, dropped below the population replacement level of 2.07 in the 1970s, setting the island-nation on the path for contraction.
It hit bottom at 1.26 in 2005 before creeping up to 1.37 last year.
To beat the drum for a new baby boom, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has appointed Mizuho Fukushima, leader of a junior coalition partner, as his State Minister for the Declining Birthrate and Gender Equality.
The former human rights lawyer -- known for advocating that married women should be allowed to keep their maiden names -- is seeking to bolster the number of nurseries and boost financial aid for women on maternity leave.
"Unfortunately 70 percent of women quit their jobs once they have a child. We want them to continue working throughout their active lives," Fukushima told AFP in a recent interview.
"Between work and the long commutes, people are exhausted when they get home," said Fukushima. "We need to regulate work hours to create a system in which men will be able to participate more in housework."
The government started allowing paternity leave several years ago, but the participation rate of fathers has hovered at a miniscule 1.2 percent.
The government plans other cash measures to help families -- 26,000 yen (290 dollars) per month for every child until middle school, the abolition of high school enrolment fees, and new benefits for single-parent families.
"That way, we will be able to create a society where having children will no longer be considered a handicap," said Fukushima.
The news is not all grim. While Japan in many ways remains a deeply traditional and male-dominated society, attitudes toward working women are changing, albeit at a snail's pace.
In a 1992 government survey, only 23 percent of Japanese said they supported the idea of women working after they give birth. That number had risen to 43 percent 15 years later.
"Little by little, Japanese society agrees that a woman can have children and work at the same time -- that's my personal view," said Yasuo Tanaka, a manager at the Centre for the Advancement of Working Women in Tokyo.
However, for sociologist Yuko Kawanishi, work is only one aspect of the fertility problem.
"The main reason is that Japanese tend to marry later and later in life, or not at all -- and also the fact that it is very rare to have children born out of wedlock," she said.
Only three percent of Japanese babies are born to unmarried couples, compared to more than 50 percent in France and the Scandinavian countries and about 40 percent in the United States.
The main factor is widespread discrimination against children born out of wedlock who, under Japanese law, have rights to only half of the parental inheritance of their "legitimate" siblings.
Fukushima said she and Justice Minister Keiko Chiba are working to change the law as a step to encourage unmarried couples to have babies.
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved
Thu Nov 26, 3:52 pm ET
TOKYO (AFP) – There are many reasons Japan's population is headed for a sharp decline, but one of them is that for working women giving birth usually spells the death of their careers.
The country's new centre-left government -- trying to defuse a ticking demographic timebomb -- is working to change laws and mindsets in a bid to boost Japan's birth rate, one of the world's lowest.
It is up against entrenched attitudes about women in the workplace and motherhood, as one twenty-something mother-to-be experienced when her employer recently handed her a pre-written resignation letter.
"The personnel department just gave me the letter," she recalled. "I was told to copy it by hand, sign it and date it. When I didn't do it immediately, the supervisor yelled at me."
"I finally gave in," said the woman, who worked at a big publishing house and asked not to be named. "In the end I was almost relieved to stop work, because the atmosphere in the office had just become so stifling."
Such cases are especially frequent for temporary workers such as the Tokyo woman, who said she had received no unemployment benefits since her 'voluntary resignation' when her boss showed her the door several months ago.
Japan's new government, which ended half a century of almost unbroken conservative rule when it took power in September, has embarked on a campaign to make Japan a more equal and family-friendly nation.
The problem is existential for Japan, the world's number two economy. Its population of about 127 million, on current trends, is projected to decline to 95 million by 2050.
That would leave the country with a ratio of only 1.5 economically active people per retiree by 2050 -- compared to about three workers per retiree now.
Japan, famously reluctant to open up its doors to more than a trickle of immigrants, is in part banking on advances in robotics to care for its army of elderly in future.
The fertility rate, the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime, dropped below the population replacement level of 2.07 in the 1970s, setting the island-nation on the path for contraction.
It hit bottom at 1.26 in 2005 before creeping up to 1.37 last year.
To beat the drum for a new baby boom, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has appointed Mizuho Fukushima, leader of a junior coalition partner, as his State Minister for the Declining Birthrate and Gender Equality.
The former human rights lawyer -- known for advocating that married women should be allowed to keep their maiden names -- is seeking to bolster the number of nurseries and boost financial aid for women on maternity leave.
"Unfortunately 70 percent of women quit their jobs once they have a child. We want them to continue working throughout their active lives," Fukushima told AFP in a recent interview.
"Between work and the long commutes, people are exhausted when they get home," said Fukushima. "We need to regulate work hours to create a system in which men will be able to participate more in housework."
The government started allowing paternity leave several years ago, but the participation rate of fathers has hovered at a miniscule 1.2 percent.
The government plans other cash measures to help families -- 26,000 yen (290 dollars) per month for every child until middle school, the abolition of high school enrolment fees, and new benefits for single-parent families.
"That way, we will be able to create a society where having children will no longer be considered a handicap," said Fukushima.
The news is not all grim. While Japan in many ways remains a deeply traditional and male-dominated society, attitudes toward working women are changing, albeit at a snail's pace.
In a 1992 government survey, only 23 percent of Japanese said they supported the idea of women working after they give birth. That number had risen to 43 percent 15 years later.
"Little by little, Japanese society agrees that a woman can have children and work at the same time -- that's my personal view," said Yasuo Tanaka, a manager at the Centre for the Advancement of Working Women in Tokyo.
However, for sociologist Yuko Kawanishi, work is only one aspect of the fertility problem.
"The main reason is that Japanese tend to marry later and later in life, or not at all -- and also the fact that it is very rare to have children born out of wedlock," she said.
Only three percent of Japanese babies are born to unmarried couples, compared to more than 50 percent in France and the Scandinavian countries and about 40 percent in the United States.
The main factor is widespread discrimination against children born out of wedlock who, under Japanese law, have rights to only half of the parental inheritance of their "legitimate" siblings.
Fukushima said she and Justice Minister Keiko Chiba are working to change the law as a step to encourage unmarried couples to have babies.
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved
Japan plans major new stimulus package
Sun Nov 29, 10:56 pm ET
TOKYO (AFP) – Japan plans an extra stimulus of at least 31 billion dollars this fiscal year that would include measures to tackle the surging yen and weak share prices, the top government spokesman said Monday.
The government needs to take "policy action in view of the strengthening yen and problems surrounding share prices" and plans spending of "no less than 2.7 trillion yen (31 billion dollars)," said government spokesman Hirofumi Hirano.
Japanese share prices have been hit in recent weeks by a strong yen which hit a 14-year high against the dollar last week.
A strong yen hurts exporters by making their goods more expensive abroad and eating into their dollar profits when they are converted back into yen.
The yen traded at 86.74-yen to the dollar in Tokyo early Monday.
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
TOKYO (AFP) – Japan plans an extra stimulus of at least 31 billion dollars this fiscal year that would include measures to tackle the surging yen and weak share prices, the top government spokesman said Monday.
The government needs to take "policy action in view of the strengthening yen and problems surrounding share prices" and plans spending of "no less than 2.7 trillion yen (31 billion dollars)," said government spokesman Hirofumi Hirano.
Japanese share prices have been hit in recent weeks by a strong yen which hit a 14-year high against the dollar last week.
A strong yen hurts exporters by making their goods more expensive abroad and eating into their dollar profits when they are converted back into yen.
The yen traded at 86.74-yen to the dollar in Tokyo early Monday.
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
Japan manga fans flock to cartoonist's funeral
(AFP) – 13 hours ago
TOKYO — Thousands of manga fans flocked to the funeral Monday of Japanese cartoonist Yoshito Usui, whose cheeky schoolboy character Shin-chan delighted millions.
More than 3,000 mourners queued to offer their last respects at central Tokyo's Aoyama Funeral Hall, where pictures, stuffed dolls, comic books and videos of Usui's characters were on display and decorated with flowers.
Usui died on a mountain hike in September.
"Mr Usui unfortunately died, but the characters created by Mr Usui are still alive," said fellow cartoonist Tetsuya Chiba, hailing the artist who created the hit "Crayon Shin-chan" series in the 1990s.
Usui, 51, who was popular among manga enthusiasts worldwide, went missing on September 11 while hiking alone in a mountain range north of Tokyo.
His bruised body was found more than a week later but police said there was no suggestion his death was a suicide.
"It was very shocking to me when I heard of his death," said one fan, Megumi Nagai, a 24-year-old female bartender. "The funeral was very valuable because I could see his works, all the comics, all the videos and the history."
Usui made his debut as a manga author in 1987 and sprang to prominence in the 1990s with Crayon Shin-chan, a magazine manga strip about the daily life of Shinnosuke, a mischievous five-year-old boy.
The series was turned into a book and an animated television series.
The cartoon books, which have sold 50 million copies in Japan alone, have been since translated and published in 14 countries, while the television series has been aired in 30 nations.
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved.
TOKYO — Thousands of manga fans flocked to the funeral Monday of Japanese cartoonist Yoshito Usui, whose cheeky schoolboy character Shin-chan delighted millions.
More than 3,000 mourners queued to offer their last respects at central Tokyo's Aoyama Funeral Hall, where pictures, stuffed dolls, comic books and videos of Usui's characters were on display and decorated with flowers.
Usui died on a mountain hike in September.
"Mr Usui unfortunately died, but the characters created by Mr Usui are still alive," said fellow cartoonist Tetsuya Chiba, hailing the artist who created the hit "Crayon Shin-chan" series in the 1990s.
Usui, 51, who was popular among manga enthusiasts worldwide, went missing on September 11 while hiking alone in a mountain range north of Tokyo.
His bruised body was found more than a week later but police said there was no suggestion his death was a suicide.
"It was very shocking to me when I heard of his death," said one fan, Megumi Nagai, a 24-year-old female bartender. "The funeral was very valuable because I could see his works, all the comics, all the videos and the history."
Usui made his debut as a manga author in 1987 and sprang to prominence in the 1990s with Crayon Shin-chan, a magazine manga strip about the daily life of Shinnosuke, a mischievous five-year-old boy.
The series was turned into a book and an animated television series.
The cartoon books, which have sold 50 million copies in Japan alone, have been since translated and published in 14 countries, while the television series has been aired in 30 nations.
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved.
Obama To Outline U.S. Goals At Climate Summit
by Scott Horsley
November 25, 2009
President Obama will commit the U.S. to a goal of cuts in greenhouse gas emissions over the next decade at a climate conference in Copenhagen next month. His goal is to cut carbon dioxide emissions by about 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020.
TRANSCRIPT
MELISSA BLOCK, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Melissa Block.
MICHELE NORRIS, host:
And I'm Michele Norris.
The White House announced today that President Obama will attend the big international conference on climate change in Copenhagen next month. Moreover, he will offer to make significant cuts in greenhouse gas emission, even though Congress hasn't taken final action yet.
NPR's Scott Horsley reports.
SCOTT HORSLEY: President Obama's first trip to Copenhagen didn't work out so well. He made a last minute dash there in September to support Chicago's Olympic bid, but came home empty handed. This time, the president is hoping for better luck when he takes his place at the starting line of an international climate conference aimed at combating global warming.
Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists thinks the president's attendance will give a needed boost to climate negotiations.
Mr. ALDEN MEYER (Director of Strategy and Policy, Union of Concerned Scientists): What the world needs from the United States is two things -clarity and confidence about what we're prepared to do.
HORSLEY: The White House says Mr. Obama will put on the table a proposal for the U.S. to cut its emissions of heat trapping gasses by about 17 percent from their 2005 levels over the next decade. That's in line with cuts narrowly approved by the House of Representatives. But the Senate hasn't voted on it's version of the climate bill. So, Meyer says the president is, in a sense, going out on a limb.
Mr. MEYER: I think he also will need to assure the world that he is personally committed to work with the Congress to get this job done back home so the world will have the confidence that will carry through on the commitments he makes.
HORSLEY: And if, say, Mr. Obama decided to attend the Copenhagen meeting after constructive talks in recent days with leaders of China and India, he's hoping to produce a tentative agreement that will ultimately lead to a legally binding treaty.
Scott Horsley, NPR News, the White House.
Copyright ©2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved.
November 25, 2009
President Obama will commit the U.S. to a goal of cuts in greenhouse gas emissions over the next decade at a climate conference in Copenhagen next month. His goal is to cut carbon dioxide emissions by about 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020.
TRANSCRIPT
MELISSA BLOCK, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Melissa Block.
MICHELE NORRIS, host:
And I'm Michele Norris.
The White House announced today that President Obama will attend the big international conference on climate change in Copenhagen next month. Moreover, he will offer to make significant cuts in greenhouse gas emission, even though Congress hasn't taken final action yet.
NPR's Scott Horsley reports.
SCOTT HORSLEY: President Obama's first trip to Copenhagen didn't work out so well. He made a last minute dash there in September to support Chicago's Olympic bid, but came home empty handed. This time, the president is hoping for better luck when he takes his place at the starting line of an international climate conference aimed at combating global warming.
Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists thinks the president's attendance will give a needed boost to climate negotiations.
Mr. ALDEN MEYER (Director of Strategy and Policy, Union of Concerned Scientists): What the world needs from the United States is two things -clarity and confidence about what we're prepared to do.
HORSLEY: The White House says Mr. Obama will put on the table a proposal for the U.S. to cut its emissions of heat trapping gasses by about 17 percent from their 2005 levels over the next decade. That's in line with cuts narrowly approved by the House of Representatives. But the Senate hasn't voted on it's version of the climate bill. So, Meyer says the president is, in a sense, going out on a limb.
Mr. MEYER: I think he also will need to assure the world that he is personally committed to work with the Congress to get this job done back home so the world will have the confidence that will carry through on the commitments he makes.
HORSLEY: And if, say, Mr. Obama decided to attend the Copenhagen meeting after constructive talks in recent days with leaders of China and India, he's hoping to produce a tentative agreement that will ultimately lead to a legally binding treaty.
Scott Horsley, NPR News, the White House.
Copyright ©2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved.
China Announces Plans To Cut Carbon Emissions
November 27, 2009
The Chinese government has announced plans to slow its greenhouse gas emissions, but the formula allows emissions to rise as China's economy expands. China already leads the world in greenhouse gases. The announcement raises questions of how effective the plan will be on cleaning up earth's atmosphere.
Copyright © 2009 National Public Radio®.
TRANSCRIPT
STEVE INSKEEP, host:
It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. Renee is celebrating the holiday today. I'm Steve Inskeep. Good morning.
China is giving some indication of just how far it's willing to go to fight global warming. The Chinese government announced a plan to slow the growth of China's carbon emissions, which are linked to climate change. China will slow their growth but not actually cut those emissions. And this announcement comes just weeks before the Copenhagen talks on climate change that take place early next month.
NPR's Anthony Kuhn joins us from Beijing to talk about this. Hi, Anthony.
ANTHONY KUHN: Hi, Steve, nice to be with you.
INSKEEP: What's it mean to slow China's growth in emissions rather than cut them?
KUHN: Well, China's plan calls for a cut in what's called carbon intensity and that means the amount of greenhouse gases they emit as measured against economic output. And because China's economy is growing at a robust rate, it could rise. For example, it could grow four-fold in the coming decades and that means that emissions could more than double.
INSKEEP: Let's talk this through so that it's clear. China is saying the average Chinese person or Chinese business will be using energy more efficiently if this plan becomes real, but still because China's economy is growing and when the economy grows, you use more energy, China will pollute more than ever before.
KUHN: Well, we have to see what China's actual growth levels are. I know there's two things at stake here. One is how much energy they use to produce that economic growth, and the other part is how much carbon they emit to get there. They are managing to use less energy, but because they are so reliant on coal and because they are in a phase of heavy industry right now - emitting an awful lot of carbon, and that is probably set to continue.
INSKEEP: Is there something of a shell game going on here then?
KUHN: Well, a lot of environmental groups think that this target is not so ambitious. A lot of people will say that actually China's carbon intensity has been declining anyway, so this is just following a trend. But I think we have to say that, you know, first of all, it's going to require some doing on China's part to fulfill these goals. They are going to have to burn cleaner coal. They are going to have to introduce more renewable energy sources like wind and solar and ramp up public transportation. I see the problem as being at the local level. A lot of inland places in China really don't have much industry. And they are going to be going in heavy on infrastructure building, buying cars, building homes, producing steel and cement. And these are the things that emit a lot of carbon.
INSKEEP: Anthony Kuhn in Beijing, I want to play you a piece of tape. This is tape from Steven Chu, the American energy secretary, who visited China earlier this year and came away he said very impressed with China's efforts to capture wind and solar energy, cleaner forms of energy.
Secretary STEVEN CHU (Department of Energy): China is ahead in certain aspects. They want very much to expand their homegrown wind capacity to develop those exquisitely efficient turbines. They are very serious about developing photovoltaic technology. And so they are looking at this, and they are spending of order $12 million an hour to generate alternative and cleaner forms of energy.
INSKEEP: How do we match up that picture of a China that's very active in this area with this other picture of China, Anthony Kuhn, that may not be doing very much at all?
KUHN: I think Secretary Chu and people like that come to Beijing and they speak to China's leaders and they sense a real commitment to reduce emissions, and that is a turnaround from five years ago. Five year ago, first of all, it's the measuring point. They're measuring cuts in carbon intensity as measured against 2005 levels, and that was really the year that they decided they're going to have to start introducing curbs on emissions.
Not because of Copenhagen, not because of global warming, so much as concerns about energy security and pollution. But as I said, you know, this commitment at the central government level is very different from the reality in the inland poorer provinces, places that need to ramp up industry.
INSKEEP: NPR's Anthony Kuhn is in Beijing. Anthony, thanks very much.
KUHN: Thank you, Steve.
Copyright ©2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved.
The Chinese government has announced plans to slow its greenhouse gas emissions, but the formula allows emissions to rise as China's economy expands. China already leads the world in greenhouse gases. The announcement raises questions of how effective the plan will be on cleaning up earth's atmosphere.
Copyright © 2009 National Public Radio®.
TRANSCRIPT
STEVE INSKEEP, host:
It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. Renee is celebrating the holiday today. I'm Steve Inskeep. Good morning.
China is giving some indication of just how far it's willing to go to fight global warming. The Chinese government announced a plan to slow the growth of China's carbon emissions, which are linked to climate change. China will slow their growth but not actually cut those emissions. And this announcement comes just weeks before the Copenhagen talks on climate change that take place early next month.
NPR's Anthony Kuhn joins us from Beijing to talk about this. Hi, Anthony.
ANTHONY KUHN: Hi, Steve, nice to be with you.
INSKEEP: What's it mean to slow China's growth in emissions rather than cut them?
KUHN: Well, China's plan calls for a cut in what's called carbon intensity and that means the amount of greenhouse gases they emit as measured against economic output. And because China's economy is growing at a robust rate, it could rise. For example, it could grow four-fold in the coming decades and that means that emissions could more than double.
INSKEEP: Let's talk this through so that it's clear. China is saying the average Chinese person or Chinese business will be using energy more efficiently if this plan becomes real, but still because China's economy is growing and when the economy grows, you use more energy, China will pollute more than ever before.
KUHN: Well, we have to see what China's actual growth levels are. I know there's two things at stake here. One is how much energy they use to produce that economic growth, and the other part is how much carbon they emit to get there. They are managing to use less energy, but because they are so reliant on coal and because they are in a phase of heavy industry right now - emitting an awful lot of carbon, and that is probably set to continue.
INSKEEP: Is there something of a shell game going on here then?
KUHN: Well, a lot of environmental groups think that this target is not so ambitious. A lot of people will say that actually China's carbon intensity has been declining anyway, so this is just following a trend. But I think we have to say that, you know, first of all, it's going to require some doing on China's part to fulfill these goals. They are going to have to burn cleaner coal. They are going to have to introduce more renewable energy sources like wind and solar and ramp up public transportation. I see the problem as being at the local level. A lot of inland places in China really don't have much industry. And they are going to be going in heavy on infrastructure building, buying cars, building homes, producing steel and cement. And these are the things that emit a lot of carbon.
INSKEEP: Anthony Kuhn in Beijing, I want to play you a piece of tape. This is tape from Steven Chu, the American energy secretary, who visited China earlier this year and came away he said very impressed with China's efforts to capture wind and solar energy, cleaner forms of energy.
Secretary STEVEN CHU (Department of Energy): China is ahead in certain aspects. They want very much to expand their homegrown wind capacity to develop those exquisitely efficient turbines. They are very serious about developing photovoltaic technology. And so they are looking at this, and they are spending of order $12 million an hour to generate alternative and cleaner forms of energy.
INSKEEP: How do we match up that picture of a China that's very active in this area with this other picture of China, Anthony Kuhn, that may not be doing very much at all?
KUHN: I think Secretary Chu and people like that come to Beijing and they speak to China's leaders and they sense a real commitment to reduce emissions, and that is a turnaround from five years ago. Five year ago, first of all, it's the measuring point. They're measuring cuts in carbon intensity as measured against 2005 levels, and that was really the year that they decided they're going to have to start introducing curbs on emissions.
Not because of Copenhagen, not because of global warming, so much as concerns about energy security and pollution. But as I said, you know, this commitment at the central government level is very different from the reality in the inland poorer provinces, places that need to ramp up industry.
INSKEEP: NPR's Anthony Kuhn is in Beijing. Anthony, thanks very much.
KUHN: Thank you, Steve.
Copyright ©2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved.
Russians Mourn Victims Of Express Train Wreck
by The Associated Press
November 29, 2009
Russians mourned at religious services and soccer stadiums Sunday after a deadly train wreck that authorities blamed on a terrorist bomb. The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church urged the nation not to give in to fear.
Relatives identified loved ones killed in the wreck of the express train. If confirmed as caused by a bombing, the wreck would be Russia's deadliest terrorist attack outside the violence-plagued North Caucasus provinces in five years.
Television networks took entertainment programs off the air and moments of silence were observed before matches on the final Sunday of the Russian football league.
Patriarch Kirill, the leader of the country's dominant church, led a service for the victims at Christ the Savior Cathedral near the Kremlin. "We will remember their sacred names," he said.
"Our people have been challenged. A crime of which any one of us could have been a victim has been committed for effect," Kirill said in a statement on the church's Web site. "They want to frighten everybody who lives in Russia."
The rear three cars of the Nevsky Express, one of Russia's fastest trains, derailed on a remote stretch of track late Friday as it sped from Moscow to St. Petersburg, killing some passengers and trapping others in the jumbled wreckage. The head of Russia's Federal Security Service, Alexander Bortnikov, said Saturday that an explosive device detonated under the train, gouging a crater in the rail bed and blowing the tail cars off the tracks.
Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu said at least 25 people were killed and 26 were unaccounted for, though he said some may have survived uninjured or never have boarded the train.
Health Minister Tatyana Golikova said 85 people remained hospitalized, 21 in grave condition, according to Russian news agencies. A Belgian and an Italian were among those hurt.
Recovering from a broken rib at a hospital in St. Petersburg, Natalya Tarasova said she and her sister were reading in the third car from the rear when she heard a bang and felt the windows shake. The car swung wildly from side to side and she was thrown to the floor, her sister toppling onto her.
"People were tossed around the carriage like rags," said Tarasova, 36, who works in a jewelry business and was returning home after an exhibition in Moscow. "Suitcases were jumping from the racks like frogs and falling on people."
She said conductors collected medicine and other items from passengers and took the supplies to the two more badly damaged rear cars, which were left hundreds of meters back and were where most of the casualties occurred.
"It was scary, but there was no panic," she said.
Relatives were identifying victims Sunday at a hospital morgue in Tver, the closest sizable city to the wreck site near the border of the Tver and Novgorod provinces, about 250 miles (400 kilometers) northwest of Moscow.
The state-run railway company, Russian Railways, said train traffic was fully restored. There were no credible claims of responsibility or word on a possible motive.
Russia has been hit by a number of major terrorist attacks since the 1991 Soviet collapse, most linked to the 1990s wars between government forces and separatist rebels in Chechnya and the violence the conflicts have spawned across the surrounding North Caucasus.
Extreme nationalists were blamed for an explosion that caused a derailment along the same railway line in 2007, injuring 27 passengers. Authorities arrested two suspects in that blast and are searching for a third, a former military officer.
November 29, 2009
Russians mourned at religious services and soccer stadiums Sunday after a deadly train wreck that authorities blamed on a terrorist bomb. The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church urged the nation not to give in to fear.
Relatives identified loved ones killed in the wreck of the express train. If confirmed as caused by a bombing, the wreck would be Russia's deadliest terrorist attack outside the violence-plagued North Caucasus provinces in five years.
Television networks took entertainment programs off the air and moments of silence were observed before matches on the final Sunday of the Russian football league.
Patriarch Kirill, the leader of the country's dominant church, led a service for the victims at Christ the Savior Cathedral near the Kremlin. "We will remember their sacred names," he said.
"Our people have been challenged. A crime of which any one of us could have been a victim has been committed for effect," Kirill said in a statement on the church's Web site. "They want to frighten everybody who lives in Russia."
The rear three cars of the Nevsky Express, one of Russia's fastest trains, derailed on a remote stretch of track late Friday as it sped from Moscow to St. Petersburg, killing some passengers and trapping others in the jumbled wreckage. The head of Russia's Federal Security Service, Alexander Bortnikov, said Saturday that an explosive device detonated under the train, gouging a crater in the rail bed and blowing the tail cars off the tracks.
Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu said at least 25 people were killed and 26 were unaccounted for, though he said some may have survived uninjured or never have boarded the train.
Health Minister Tatyana Golikova said 85 people remained hospitalized, 21 in grave condition, according to Russian news agencies. A Belgian and an Italian were among those hurt.
Recovering from a broken rib at a hospital in St. Petersburg, Natalya Tarasova said she and her sister were reading in the third car from the rear when she heard a bang and felt the windows shake. The car swung wildly from side to side and she was thrown to the floor, her sister toppling onto her.
"People were tossed around the carriage like rags," said Tarasova, 36, who works in a jewelry business and was returning home after an exhibition in Moscow. "Suitcases were jumping from the racks like frogs and falling on people."
She said conductors collected medicine and other items from passengers and took the supplies to the two more badly damaged rear cars, which were left hundreds of meters back and were where most of the casualties occurred.
"It was scary, but there was no panic," she said.
Relatives were identifying victims Sunday at a hospital morgue in Tver, the closest sizable city to the wreck site near the border of the Tver and Novgorod provinces, about 250 miles (400 kilometers) northwest of Moscow.
The state-run railway company, Russian Railways, said train traffic was fully restored. There were no credible claims of responsibility or word on a possible motive.
Russia has been hit by a number of major terrorist attacks since the 1991 Soviet collapse, most linked to the 1990s wars between government forces and separatist rebels in Chechnya and the violence the conflicts have spawned across the surrounding North Caucasus.
Extreme nationalists were blamed for an explosion that caused a derailment along the same railway line in 2007, injuring 27 passengers. Authorities arrested two suspects in that blast and are searching for a third, a former military officer.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
In Japan, an Odd Perch for Google: Looking Up at the Leader
November 30, 2009
By HIROKO TABUCHI
TOKYO — In 2001, a fledgling Internet company named Google opened its first overseas office in Japan, eager to tap a huge technology market.
But after eight years, Japan is one of a few major countries Google has yet to conquer. The Web giant still trails far behind Yahoo Japan, the front-runner here, operated by the Japanese telecommunications giant Softbank.
In a reversal of the rivalry in the United States, Yahoo Japan dominates Japan’s Web search market with 56.5 percent of all queries, according to the Internet research company, GA-Pro. Google, at 33.7 percent, is a distant second.
Unaccustomed to being second, Google is bending some of its most time-honored traditions in a renewed push into the Japanese market. Earlier this year, Google’s splash page for Japan abandoned the company’s classic spare design and added links to YouTube, Gmail and other services — an attempt to lure Japanese users who favor sites decorated with a cacophony of text and graphics.
And in a first for Google, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., it initiated branding ads for Japan and staged attention-grabbing publicity stunts, including one in which it invited passers-by to float into the air with the help of 2,500 balloons.
Google’s dogged interest in Japan has partly to do with sheer size. Japan is one of the world’s most wired countries, with more than 90 million regular Internet users — of which three-quarters use fast broadband connections and two-thirds also log in from cellphones.
And despite a sluggish economy, Japan’s 6.6 trillion yen ($77 billion) advertising market remains the world’s second-largest, one that an increasingly global advertising force like Google cannot afford to ignore.
“Japan is absolutely a key market for Google,” said Koichiro Tsujino, president of Google Japan. Every day, for example, Japanese view 10 million clips on YouTube, Google’s video-sharing site — and that is just from their cellphones, making them the world’s most avid adopters of video on-the-go. “Japan leads the world in many ways,” he said.
That Japanese propensity to try new things is the other reason Google is intent on staying put in Japan. Over the years, Japan has become a testing lab for many of the Web giant’s cutting-edge new ideas, especially in mobile technology. Google’s Tokyo-based programmers, immersed in Japan’s mobile and Web culture, have become a valuable source of ideas for the entire company.
Overseas markets now account for half of Google’s revenue, and the company is becoming more keenly aware of the need to tailor its services to local markets, as well as the advantages of absorbing ideas from outside the United States, company executives say. “Japan made us realize that non-U.S. ideas can go global,” David Eun, a vice president for Google, said on a recent trip to Japan, where he closed deals with two Japanese broadcasters to allow YouTube to run some of their content.
Google Japan’s offices occupy several floors in a skyscraper in Shibuya, a Tokyo neighborhood popular with start-ups that is also a hangout for the city’s hippest teenagers. Minutes away from where Google developers work, young Japanese perch on sidewalks, playing with their Web-enabled cellphones, thumbs flying and eyes glued to the tiny screens.
But most of those trendsetters do not regard Google as being very Japanese — a big headache for the company. Google has never been able to overcome Yahoo’s advantage as the first Web-based search engine. And although 35 percent of Yahoo Japan is owned by Yahoo in Sunnyvale, Calif., it is viewed as a local company.
“Yahoo Japan is a Japanese company, and most of their employees are Japanese people who fluently understand how the Japanese mind-set and business work,” said Nobuyuki Hayashi, a technology analyst. “But Google’s still a foreigner who’s learned how to speak some Japanese.”
Popularizing Google in Japan has been fraught with 21st-century versions of the cultural mishaps that have long plagued American companies here. In May, Google was forced to reshoot its entire “Street View” image stock in Japan — with a camera positioned to capture views 15 inches lower — after intense criticism that the service peeked over fences and into people’s homes, invading privacy. The narrower width of Japan’s roads made the service especially intrusive, bloggers fumed.
Google Earth also came under fire after posting historical maps that detailed locations of former communities of an “untouchable” caste, still a sensitive topic in Japan. Human rights advocates were furious that the maps could be used to identify families that had lived in the low-caste neighborhoods.
But Google keeps trying. After studying feedback from Japanese users, developers designed Google’s maps service here so that a query led users to the town’s train station or bus terminal, not the center of town as it would in the United States, reflecting the way the Japanese, heavily reliant on public transportation, think of their personal geography.
Programmers based in Tokyo have proposed and developed a line of services and functions, including “emoticons” for Gmail — a particular Japanese obsession — and a function allowing users to add photos to Google Maps. It created “Spellmeleon,” to correct misspelled queries. It took developers based in Tokyo to realize that non-native English speakers, who might not be very good spellers of English words, could use a little help with queries.
“Part of our job is to think specifically about the Japanese market,” said Kentaro Tokusei, group product manager at Google Japan. “We find whatever we build works globally, too.”
Some services in Japan offer a glimpse into the future. The Japanese version of Google’s photo-sharing service, Picasa, offers quick response, or Q.R., bar codes that contain Web address information. Scanning a Q.R. bar code with a Japanese cellphone takes the user to a Web site to view an online photo album.
Japan has been an especially important market for YouTube, with viewers here making up the site’s biggest audience outside the United States. The site’s big presence in Japan has put developers here at the forefront of crucial projects — for example, a recently announced feature that will bring text captions to many videos on the site, linked with automatic translation into 51 languages.
The captions will go a long way toward helping videos go viral across language divides, said Hiroto Tokusei, YouTube product manager in Japan and Kentaro Tokusei’s younger brother. (The Tokusei brothers, both Stanford graduates with experience in Silicon Valley, were brought to Google Japan with an eye to localizing Google’s products while keeping Google at the cutting edge of innovation.)
Next month YouTube will also start a mobile version of its “Click-to-Buy” feature, which identifies songs used in video clips, then lets users download them to their cellphones for use as ring tones.
“To have an audience so obsessed with video and TV, and with access to broadband, means Japan is the perfect place to experiment,” Mr. Tokusei said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
By HIROKO TABUCHI
TOKYO — In 2001, a fledgling Internet company named Google opened its first overseas office in Japan, eager to tap a huge technology market.
But after eight years, Japan is one of a few major countries Google has yet to conquer. The Web giant still trails far behind Yahoo Japan, the front-runner here, operated by the Japanese telecommunications giant Softbank.
In a reversal of the rivalry in the United States, Yahoo Japan dominates Japan’s Web search market with 56.5 percent of all queries, according to the Internet research company, GA-Pro. Google, at 33.7 percent, is a distant second.
Unaccustomed to being second, Google is bending some of its most time-honored traditions in a renewed push into the Japanese market. Earlier this year, Google’s splash page for Japan abandoned the company’s classic spare design and added links to YouTube, Gmail and other services — an attempt to lure Japanese users who favor sites decorated with a cacophony of text and graphics.
And in a first for Google, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., it initiated branding ads for Japan and staged attention-grabbing publicity stunts, including one in which it invited passers-by to float into the air with the help of 2,500 balloons.
Google’s dogged interest in Japan has partly to do with sheer size. Japan is one of the world’s most wired countries, with more than 90 million regular Internet users — of which three-quarters use fast broadband connections and two-thirds also log in from cellphones.
And despite a sluggish economy, Japan’s 6.6 trillion yen ($77 billion) advertising market remains the world’s second-largest, one that an increasingly global advertising force like Google cannot afford to ignore.
“Japan is absolutely a key market for Google,” said Koichiro Tsujino, president of Google Japan. Every day, for example, Japanese view 10 million clips on YouTube, Google’s video-sharing site — and that is just from their cellphones, making them the world’s most avid adopters of video on-the-go. “Japan leads the world in many ways,” he said.
That Japanese propensity to try new things is the other reason Google is intent on staying put in Japan. Over the years, Japan has become a testing lab for many of the Web giant’s cutting-edge new ideas, especially in mobile technology. Google’s Tokyo-based programmers, immersed in Japan’s mobile and Web culture, have become a valuable source of ideas for the entire company.
Overseas markets now account for half of Google’s revenue, and the company is becoming more keenly aware of the need to tailor its services to local markets, as well as the advantages of absorbing ideas from outside the United States, company executives say. “Japan made us realize that non-U.S. ideas can go global,” David Eun, a vice president for Google, said on a recent trip to Japan, where he closed deals with two Japanese broadcasters to allow YouTube to run some of their content.
Google Japan’s offices occupy several floors in a skyscraper in Shibuya, a Tokyo neighborhood popular with start-ups that is also a hangout for the city’s hippest teenagers. Minutes away from where Google developers work, young Japanese perch on sidewalks, playing with their Web-enabled cellphones, thumbs flying and eyes glued to the tiny screens.
But most of those trendsetters do not regard Google as being very Japanese — a big headache for the company. Google has never been able to overcome Yahoo’s advantage as the first Web-based search engine. And although 35 percent of Yahoo Japan is owned by Yahoo in Sunnyvale, Calif., it is viewed as a local company.
“Yahoo Japan is a Japanese company, and most of their employees are Japanese people who fluently understand how the Japanese mind-set and business work,” said Nobuyuki Hayashi, a technology analyst. “But Google’s still a foreigner who’s learned how to speak some Japanese.”
Popularizing Google in Japan has been fraught with 21st-century versions of the cultural mishaps that have long plagued American companies here. In May, Google was forced to reshoot its entire “Street View” image stock in Japan — with a camera positioned to capture views 15 inches lower — after intense criticism that the service peeked over fences and into people’s homes, invading privacy. The narrower width of Japan’s roads made the service especially intrusive, bloggers fumed.
Google Earth also came under fire after posting historical maps that detailed locations of former communities of an “untouchable” caste, still a sensitive topic in Japan. Human rights advocates were furious that the maps could be used to identify families that had lived in the low-caste neighborhoods.
But Google keeps trying. After studying feedback from Japanese users, developers designed Google’s maps service here so that a query led users to the town’s train station or bus terminal, not the center of town as it would in the United States, reflecting the way the Japanese, heavily reliant on public transportation, think of their personal geography.
Programmers based in Tokyo have proposed and developed a line of services and functions, including “emoticons” for Gmail — a particular Japanese obsession — and a function allowing users to add photos to Google Maps. It created “Spellmeleon,” to correct misspelled queries. It took developers based in Tokyo to realize that non-native English speakers, who might not be very good spellers of English words, could use a little help with queries.
“Part of our job is to think specifically about the Japanese market,” said Kentaro Tokusei, group product manager at Google Japan. “We find whatever we build works globally, too.”
Some services in Japan offer a glimpse into the future. The Japanese version of Google’s photo-sharing service, Picasa, offers quick response, or Q.R., bar codes that contain Web address information. Scanning a Q.R. bar code with a Japanese cellphone takes the user to a Web site to view an online photo album.
Japan has been an especially important market for YouTube, with viewers here making up the site’s biggest audience outside the United States. The site’s big presence in Japan has put developers here at the forefront of crucial projects — for example, a recently announced feature that will bring text captions to many videos on the site, linked with automatic translation into 51 languages.
The captions will go a long way toward helping videos go viral across language divides, said Hiroto Tokusei, YouTube product manager in Japan and Kentaro Tokusei’s younger brother. (The Tokusei brothers, both Stanford graduates with experience in Silicon Valley, were brought to Google Japan with an eye to localizing Google’s products while keeping Google at the cutting edge of innovation.)
Next month YouTube will also start a mobile version of its “Click-to-Buy” feature, which identifies songs used in video clips, then lets users download them to their cellphones for use as ring tones.
“To have an audience so obsessed with video and TV, and with access to broadband, means Japan is the perfect place to experiment,” Mr. Tokusei said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
Failure Offers Lessons Japan Would Rather Forget
September 6, 2009
By PETER S. GOODMAN
FOR Americans, failure tends to be accepted as an intrinsic feature of an economic system in which risk-taking often brings great reward. If necessity is the mother of invention, then failure is the unfortunate progeny of often-lucrative adventuring.
Failure is, of course, wrenching. Yet the American narrative is littered with examples of heroes’ transcending past calamities, their failures worn as badges of resilience.
In Japan, by contrast, failure traditionally carries a deeper stigma, an enduring shame that limits the appetite for risk, in the view of many of the nation’s cultural observers. This makes the Japanese far less comfortable with choices that increase the prospect of failure, even if they promise greater potential gains.
Recent Japanese governments have sought to inculcate greater tolerance for failure — often at the urging of American officials — to inject new life in a long-stagnant economy. The Tokyo government even chartered an Association for the Study of Failure, which aimed to “turn failure experience into knowledge at the society, corporation and individual levels.”
But last week, the differing cultural conceptions of the United States and Japan snapped into view, as Japanese voters emphatically dismissed the party that had ruled almost uninterrupted for more than half a century. In so doing, they offered up a palpable message: Enough with the failure thing already. And enough with Americans offering up pain as the cure for what ails Japan.
In the two decades since Japan devolved from a supposedly indomitable economic juggernaut in the 1980s into a stagnant economy mired in a Lost Decade, the country tried myriad reforms in the name of reinvigorating its economy. It took stabs at rooting out bad loans from the banking system and ending the inside dealing that had long defined Japanese business culture. It sought to pare down government-financed public works projects, a major source of jobs.
Yet all the while, Japan remained an economic laggard, a shadow of the nation that had previously occasioned overheated talk of Japanese global dominance. Despite the pain of reform, Japan never seemed to get the gain.
Many economists argue that Japan never shook off the hangover of speculative excesses on real estate that fueled the 1980s because it never genuinely reformed. Money-losing “zombie” companies were allowed to keep drawing fresh credit and survive. Insolvent banks were spared from collapse because they were deemed “too big to fail.”
Regardless, among ordinary people, the sense took hold that the reforms were both harsh and ineffective. Despite its capitalist trappings, Japan has sometimes been referred to as the world’s most successful socialist economy, a land in which life-long job security seemed a birthright. Amid the attempts to rein in government spending and pressure banks to cut off money-losing clients, Japanese workers learned the humiliation of unemployment; Japanese companies confronted the embarrassment of going out of business. More than an economic event, this tore at the fabric of Japanese life.
In 2003, I visited Kushiro, a port city on Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido, which had for decades been sustained by government-led construction. Japan’s reformist prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, was then rolling back public works spending and pressuring banks to clean up their books.
The president of the Kushiro Credit Association complained that the new policies were effectively forcing him to inflict his customers with the stigma of failure.
“We can’t just cut them off,” he said. “Everyone would know about it. It would be very difficult for people who failed to live here.”
From the perspective of everyday Japanese life, shock treatment seemed both cruel and unnecessary. Japan had become a much darker place than in the 1980s, when the elixir of wealth seemed at hand, yet it was nothing like crisis-wracked Indonesia or Argentina, where people rioted in the streets as life savings vanished. It was a slow slide from a comfortable perch.
Tokyo never failed to shimmer with modernity. The national rail system was as efficient as any on earth. Even as ordinary Japanese gained economic anxiety and ratcheted down aspirations, most still had decent homes and cars, health care financed by the state, and a world-beating array of gadgets.
Many Japanese seemed perplexed by the dire talk that accompanied the push for reform. In Nagano, a city that had boomed with construction during the 1980s, suspicions about the reform trajectory were intense as Mr. Koizumi pushed to cleanse the banks of bad loans. Newspapers and television were full of grim talk about the corporate failures this would entail.
“I don’t really see how the economy will get better if you just close a big company and fire people,” said a 37-year-old housewife whose husband worked at the electronics giant Fujitsu. His pay had been cut by one-fifth. The local work force had been slashed by half. But she said she was more inclined to hang on to what they had — a 10-year-old Honda sedan, outdated kitchen appliances — than risk his paycheck in a bid for what seemed an abstraction: a healthy financial system.
By the time Japanese voters went to the polls last week, they must surely have noticed that, when crisis afflicted the United States, Americans seemed no more eager to ingest the medicine Washington once dispensed for Japan. Faced with soaring joblessness and financial calamity, Americans propped up their auto industry, saved banks deemed too big to fail, and unleashed nearly $800 billion in government spending to spare jobs. (Moreover, Americans have come to wish they had been a little more afraid of failure.)
Japanese voters did not appear to be approving a coherent economic policy so much as rejecting a seemingly bankrupt one. The new ruling Democratic Party of Japan gained votes with vague promises of subsidies and job protections.
Ultimately, the vote seemed to signal Japan’s verdict that the embrace of failure had, in the end, proven a failure, opting instead for the comfort of trying to muddle through.
Peter S. Goodman, a reporter for The Times, spent nearly a decade reporting from Asia. He is the author of “Past Due: The End of Easy Money and the Renewal of the American Economy.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
By PETER S. GOODMAN
FOR Americans, failure tends to be accepted as an intrinsic feature of an economic system in which risk-taking often brings great reward. If necessity is the mother of invention, then failure is the unfortunate progeny of often-lucrative adventuring.
Failure is, of course, wrenching. Yet the American narrative is littered with examples of heroes’ transcending past calamities, their failures worn as badges of resilience.
In Japan, by contrast, failure traditionally carries a deeper stigma, an enduring shame that limits the appetite for risk, in the view of many of the nation’s cultural observers. This makes the Japanese far less comfortable with choices that increase the prospect of failure, even if they promise greater potential gains.
Recent Japanese governments have sought to inculcate greater tolerance for failure — often at the urging of American officials — to inject new life in a long-stagnant economy. The Tokyo government even chartered an Association for the Study of Failure, which aimed to “turn failure experience into knowledge at the society, corporation and individual levels.”
But last week, the differing cultural conceptions of the United States and Japan snapped into view, as Japanese voters emphatically dismissed the party that had ruled almost uninterrupted for more than half a century. In so doing, they offered up a palpable message: Enough with the failure thing already. And enough with Americans offering up pain as the cure for what ails Japan.
In the two decades since Japan devolved from a supposedly indomitable economic juggernaut in the 1980s into a stagnant economy mired in a Lost Decade, the country tried myriad reforms in the name of reinvigorating its economy. It took stabs at rooting out bad loans from the banking system and ending the inside dealing that had long defined Japanese business culture. It sought to pare down government-financed public works projects, a major source of jobs.
Yet all the while, Japan remained an economic laggard, a shadow of the nation that had previously occasioned overheated talk of Japanese global dominance. Despite the pain of reform, Japan never seemed to get the gain.
Many economists argue that Japan never shook off the hangover of speculative excesses on real estate that fueled the 1980s because it never genuinely reformed. Money-losing “zombie” companies were allowed to keep drawing fresh credit and survive. Insolvent banks were spared from collapse because they were deemed “too big to fail.”
Regardless, among ordinary people, the sense took hold that the reforms were both harsh and ineffective. Despite its capitalist trappings, Japan has sometimes been referred to as the world’s most successful socialist economy, a land in which life-long job security seemed a birthright. Amid the attempts to rein in government spending and pressure banks to cut off money-losing clients, Japanese workers learned the humiliation of unemployment; Japanese companies confronted the embarrassment of going out of business. More than an economic event, this tore at the fabric of Japanese life.
In 2003, I visited Kushiro, a port city on Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido, which had for decades been sustained by government-led construction. Japan’s reformist prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, was then rolling back public works spending and pressuring banks to clean up their books.
The president of the Kushiro Credit Association complained that the new policies were effectively forcing him to inflict his customers with the stigma of failure.
“We can’t just cut them off,” he said. “Everyone would know about it. It would be very difficult for people who failed to live here.”
From the perspective of everyday Japanese life, shock treatment seemed both cruel and unnecessary. Japan had become a much darker place than in the 1980s, when the elixir of wealth seemed at hand, yet it was nothing like crisis-wracked Indonesia or Argentina, where people rioted in the streets as life savings vanished. It was a slow slide from a comfortable perch.
Tokyo never failed to shimmer with modernity. The national rail system was as efficient as any on earth. Even as ordinary Japanese gained economic anxiety and ratcheted down aspirations, most still had decent homes and cars, health care financed by the state, and a world-beating array of gadgets.
Many Japanese seemed perplexed by the dire talk that accompanied the push for reform. In Nagano, a city that had boomed with construction during the 1980s, suspicions about the reform trajectory were intense as Mr. Koizumi pushed to cleanse the banks of bad loans. Newspapers and television were full of grim talk about the corporate failures this would entail.
“I don’t really see how the economy will get better if you just close a big company and fire people,” said a 37-year-old housewife whose husband worked at the electronics giant Fujitsu. His pay had been cut by one-fifth. The local work force had been slashed by half. But she said she was more inclined to hang on to what they had — a 10-year-old Honda sedan, outdated kitchen appliances — than risk his paycheck in a bid for what seemed an abstraction: a healthy financial system.
By the time Japanese voters went to the polls last week, they must surely have noticed that, when crisis afflicted the United States, Americans seemed no more eager to ingest the medicine Washington once dispensed for Japan. Faced with soaring joblessness and financial calamity, Americans propped up their auto industry, saved banks deemed too big to fail, and unleashed nearly $800 billion in government spending to spare jobs. (Moreover, Americans have come to wish they had been a little more afraid of failure.)
Japanese voters did not appear to be approving a coherent economic policy so much as rejecting a seemingly bankrupt one. The new ruling Democratic Party of Japan gained votes with vague promises of subsidies and job protections.
Ultimately, the vote seemed to signal Japan’s verdict that the embrace of failure had, in the end, proven a failure, opting instead for the comfort of trying to muddle through.
Peter S. Goodman, a reporter for The Times, spent nearly a decade reporting from Asia. He is the author of “Past Due: The End of Easy Money and the Renewal of the American Economy.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
U.S. film puts Japanese town on defensive for dolphin slaughter
'The Cove' offers a rare look at the kills in Taiji, which sought to keep them off limits. Some residents are unmoved by global outrage over the bloody practice. 'We are who we are,' one says.
By John M. Glionna
September 13, 2009
Reporting from Taiji, Japan
Keiko Hirao sits on pebbly Whale Beach in the late morning sun, taking in this town's main summertime attraction -- two playful dolphins swimming alongside tourists in a picturesque cove.
The creatures flap their tails and perform acrobatic jumps as dozens of delighted children tread water in the aquatic petting zoo. But Hirao is troubled. She knows something that many other tourists here don't.
"When I found out," the Osaka resident said, "I cried."
Each September, Whale Beach is closed to swimming. That's when the dolphin slaughter begins.
Taiji is one of the few towns worldwide where the mammals are legally herded from the sea and killed in groups so their meat can be sold at market, experts say.
Over seven months, 2,300 of the dolphins are steered into a hidden cove, where the choicest specimens are selected for sale to dolphin parks for $150,000 each. The rest are speared by fishermen in a frenzy of blood and thrashing fins.
Officials of the isolated town of 3,500 residents on Japan's southeastern coast have long blocked outsiders from observing the kills. Now a controversial U.S.-made film documenting the carnage has unleashed worldwide outrage over the practice and led the fishermen to say they will release 100 dolphins from the year's first catch (while making no promises about cutting back on future kills).
"The Cove," winner of the 2009 Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, portrays Taiji as a charming burg with a darker self, a place where Norman Rockwell meets Norman Bates.
To foil efforts to block their access, the filmmakers used divers with sophisticated underwater equipment, aerial drones, as well as surveillance and military-style thermal cameras. The result is part graphic horror flick, part suspense thriller and part "gotcha" movie, its dramatic scenes of determined undercover police giving chase to cameramen ending with chilling footage of churning water stained red.
Ric O'Barry, the documentary's human protagonist, is a dolphin trainer-turned-activist who has traveled to Taiji for 15 years to crusade against the hunt.
Once the dolphin trainer for the 1960s TV series "Flipper," the 68-year-old now feels partially responsible for people's fascination with captive-dolphin shows.
"In my life, I have watched dolphins give birth and have nursed them back to health when they were sick. I've captured and trained them," he said. "When I go to this cove and see the slaughter, it sickens me.
"It's just over the top in terms of cruelty. It has kept me awake at night for 15 years. Once you see it, you can't un-see it."
Officials here say dolphin hunts have long been a part of Taiji's fishing culture. Although many have seen segments of "The Cove" on the Internet, most would not discuss the issue.
"If you want to talk about dolphins, it's very difficult to have a conversation," said one town official who declined to give his name.
In a rare interview, one fisherman defended the cove's restricted status.
"In the West, the places where you kill the cows and pigs are always off limits," said Shuichi Matsumoto, who has gone on the dolphin hunt for years.
Joining 25 other fishermen on specially equipped boats, he bangs a long submerged pole with a hammer to create a wall of sound that drives the acoustically sensitive mammals toward shore, where they are killed the following day.
"We don't want to show this to anyone."
In a park overlooking Taiji's majestic coastline, residents gather each April 29 at a statue of a large right whale to pray for the souls of the creatures taken from the sea.
The local catch once was mostly large cetaceans, a practice that goes back centuries here, and Taiji prides itself as the birthplace of Japanese whaling. But ancient scrolls show that dolphins were also hunted here, say officials at the Taiji Whale Museum.
These days, the town is dominated by symbols of the catch. There are whale statues, whale-tail fountains and a dolphin-themed resort. Public buses are promoted by cutesy whale cartoon figures.
O'Barry first came to Taiji in 1993, guiding journalists interested in writing about the dolphin kills. He was harassed by supporters of the hunt and soon resorted to disguises involving wigs, hats, sunglasses and even dresses.
Louie Psihoyos, the director of "The Cove," first thought O'Barry was paranoid but soon saw that Taiji meant business about its privacy.
"They told us they treated the dolphins humanely, like relatives," Psihoyos said of his initial meeting with local officials. "Then they threatened us. They said it was dangerous for us to be there."
The filmmakers say many Japanese outside Taiji still don't know about the dolphin kills, and they plan to release a Japanese version free on the Internet if they don't find a distributor here.
For years, Japan has faced worldwide protests over its whaling industry. After the International Whaling Commission instituted a commercial whaling moratorium in the mid-1980s, the country announced that it would continue to harvest a small number of whales for scientific purposes.
Japan insists that dolphins, whose meat is served mostly in the countryside, and other small cetaceans are not covered by the moratorium.
The Japanese kill about 20,000 dolphins a year, most harpooned in the open sea. Taiji is the only place where the creatures are herded to shore and then killed, said Shigeki Takaya, an official with the Fisheries Ministry. He said the government monitors the dolphin kills.
"Most reporters tell one side of the story," he said. "They are prejudiced, so I usually don't comment on this. We have to respect our own culture. But why do you only focus on Taiji?
"We are not the only nation that kills dolphins," he said, pointing out that Canada, the Faeroe Islands and Denmark also hunt several species of dolphin. "Why not report about that?"
Yet some Taiji residents are conflicted.
"I know people think we are all barbarians," Councilman Hisato Ryono said. "There has to be another way to kill these creatures without making them suffer. But I don't know what it is."
Concerned about dangerous levels of mercury in the animals, Ryono helped persuade the town to pull dolphin meat from school lunches. Officials are also conducting tests among residents for mercury levels.
Ryono, who supports the dolphin hunt, said he first had doubts about the practice on a kayak trip when he paddled alongside the highly intelligent mammals and felt what he called a sense of peace and healing.
That night, at a barbecue where dolphin meat was being served, he asked whether anyone else felt strange eating such a wonderful animal. None did.
He said dolphin fishermen worry that "The Cove" might cause enough gaiatsu, or outside pressure, to force them to stop. But 48-year-old fisherman Matsumoto, chain-smoking during a two-hour interview, said no amount of gaiatsu would end the practice.
He believes filmmakers enhanced the documentary to make the cove seem bloodier. He also said that the fishermen changed their killing technique five years ago and believes the makers of "The Cove" used footage of old kills to mislead viewers.
"Killing in groups, we often missed our marks right behind the dolphin's head," Matsumoto said. "They died more slowly. There was too much blood. It didn't look good, and the meat didn't taste as good."
Now dolphins are separated and killed individually. Like a matador, he said, he can hit his mark "99.9%" of the time. "I know the spot," he said.
"I can make a kill in 10 seconds."
He defended Taiji and his neighbors.
"This is not an evil town. Nice people live here," he said. "But we are not going to stop this practice. We are who we are."
john.glionna@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
By John M. Glionna
September 13, 2009
Reporting from Taiji, Japan
Keiko Hirao sits on pebbly Whale Beach in the late morning sun, taking in this town's main summertime attraction -- two playful dolphins swimming alongside tourists in a picturesque cove.
The creatures flap their tails and perform acrobatic jumps as dozens of delighted children tread water in the aquatic petting zoo. But Hirao is troubled. She knows something that many other tourists here don't.
"When I found out," the Osaka resident said, "I cried."
Each September, Whale Beach is closed to swimming. That's when the dolphin slaughter begins.
Taiji is one of the few towns worldwide where the mammals are legally herded from the sea and killed in groups so their meat can be sold at market, experts say.
Over seven months, 2,300 of the dolphins are steered into a hidden cove, where the choicest specimens are selected for sale to dolphin parks for $150,000 each. The rest are speared by fishermen in a frenzy of blood and thrashing fins.
Officials of the isolated town of 3,500 residents on Japan's southeastern coast have long blocked outsiders from observing the kills. Now a controversial U.S.-made film documenting the carnage has unleashed worldwide outrage over the practice and led the fishermen to say they will release 100 dolphins from the year's first catch (while making no promises about cutting back on future kills).
"The Cove," winner of the 2009 Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, portrays Taiji as a charming burg with a darker self, a place where Norman Rockwell meets Norman Bates.
To foil efforts to block their access, the filmmakers used divers with sophisticated underwater equipment, aerial drones, as well as surveillance and military-style thermal cameras. The result is part graphic horror flick, part suspense thriller and part "gotcha" movie, its dramatic scenes of determined undercover police giving chase to cameramen ending with chilling footage of churning water stained red.
Ric O'Barry, the documentary's human protagonist, is a dolphin trainer-turned-activist who has traveled to Taiji for 15 years to crusade against the hunt.
Once the dolphin trainer for the 1960s TV series "Flipper," the 68-year-old now feels partially responsible for people's fascination with captive-dolphin shows.
"In my life, I have watched dolphins give birth and have nursed them back to health when they were sick. I've captured and trained them," he said. "When I go to this cove and see the slaughter, it sickens me.
"It's just over the top in terms of cruelty. It has kept me awake at night for 15 years. Once you see it, you can't un-see it."
Officials here say dolphin hunts have long been a part of Taiji's fishing culture. Although many have seen segments of "The Cove" on the Internet, most would not discuss the issue.
"If you want to talk about dolphins, it's very difficult to have a conversation," said one town official who declined to give his name.
In a rare interview, one fisherman defended the cove's restricted status.
"In the West, the places where you kill the cows and pigs are always off limits," said Shuichi Matsumoto, who has gone on the dolphin hunt for years.
Joining 25 other fishermen on specially equipped boats, he bangs a long submerged pole with a hammer to create a wall of sound that drives the acoustically sensitive mammals toward shore, where they are killed the following day.
"We don't want to show this to anyone."
In a park overlooking Taiji's majestic coastline, residents gather each April 29 at a statue of a large right whale to pray for the souls of the creatures taken from the sea.
The local catch once was mostly large cetaceans, a practice that goes back centuries here, and Taiji prides itself as the birthplace of Japanese whaling. But ancient scrolls show that dolphins were also hunted here, say officials at the Taiji Whale Museum.
These days, the town is dominated by symbols of the catch. There are whale statues, whale-tail fountains and a dolphin-themed resort. Public buses are promoted by cutesy whale cartoon figures.
O'Barry first came to Taiji in 1993, guiding journalists interested in writing about the dolphin kills. He was harassed by supporters of the hunt and soon resorted to disguises involving wigs, hats, sunglasses and even dresses.
Louie Psihoyos, the director of "The Cove," first thought O'Barry was paranoid but soon saw that Taiji meant business about its privacy.
"They told us they treated the dolphins humanely, like relatives," Psihoyos said of his initial meeting with local officials. "Then they threatened us. They said it was dangerous for us to be there."
The filmmakers say many Japanese outside Taiji still don't know about the dolphin kills, and they plan to release a Japanese version free on the Internet if they don't find a distributor here.
For years, Japan has faced worldwide protests over its whaling industry. After the International Whaling Commission instituted a commercial whaling moratorium in the mid-1980s, the country announced that it would continue to harvest a small number of whales for scientific purposes.
Japan insists that dolphins, whose meat is served mostly in the countryside, and other small cetaceans are not covered by the moratorium.
The Japanese kill about 20,000 dolphins a year, most harpooned in the open sea. Taiji is the only place where the creatures are herded to shore and then killed, said Shigeki Takaya, an official with the Fisheries Ministry. He said the government monitors the dolphin kills.
"Most reporters tell one side of the story," he said. "They are prejudiced, so I usually don't comment on this. We have to respect our own culture. But why do you only focus on Taiji?
"We are not the only nation that kills dolphins," he said, pointing out that Canada, the Faeroe Islands and Denmark also hunt several species of dolphin. "Why not report about that?"
Yet some Taiji residents are conflicted.
"I know people think we are all barbarians," Councilman Hisato Ryono said. "There has to be another way to kill these creatures without making them suffer. But I don't know what it is."
Concerned about dangerous levels of mercury in the animals, Ryono helped persuade the town to pull dolphin meat from school lunches. Officials are also conducting tests among residents for mercury levels.
Ryono, who supports the dolphin hunt, said he first had doubts about the practice on a kayak trip when he paddled alongside the highly intelligent mammals and felt what he called a sense of peace and healing.
That night, at a barbecue where dolphin meat was being served, he asked whether anyone else felt strange eating such a wonderful animal. None did.
He said dolphin fishermen worry that "The Cove" might cause enough gaiatsu, or outside pressure, to force them to stop. But 48-year-old fisherman Matsumoto, chain-smoking during a two-hour interview, said no amount of gaiatsu would end the practice.
He believes filmmakers enhanced the documentary to make the cove seem bloodier. He also said that the fishermen changed their killing technique five years ago and believes the makers of "The Cove" used footage of old kills to mislead viewers.
"Killing in groups, we often missed our marks right behind the dolphin's head," Matsumoto said. "They died more slowly. There was too much blood. It didn't look good, and the meat didn't taste as good."
Now dolphins are separated and killed individually. Like a matador, he said, he can hit his mark "99.9%" of the time. "I know the spot," he said.
"I can make a kill in 10 seconds."
He defended Taiji and his neighbors.
"This is not an evil town. Nice people live here," he said. "But we are not going to stop this practice. We are who we are."
john.glionna@latimes.com
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
In response to some of your questions, here is how I hope this day will work:
September 20, 2009
Tuna Town in Japan Sees Falloff of Its Fish
By MARTIN FACKLER
OMA, Japan — Fishermen here call it “black gold,” referring to the dark red flesh of the Pacific bluefin tuna that is so prized in this sashimi-loving nation that just one of these sleek fish, which can weigh a half-ton, can earn tens of thousands of dollars.
The cold waters here once yielded such an abundance of bluefin, with such thick layers of tasty rich fat, that this tiny wind-swept seaport became Japan’s answer to California’s Napa Valley or the Brie cheese-producing region of France: a geographic location that is nearly synonymous with one of its nation’s premier foods.
So strong is the allure of Oma’s tuna that during the autumn fishing season, tens of thousands of hungry visitors descend on this remote fishing town, located on the northernmost tip of Japan’s main island of Honshu. On a recent Sunday, dozens of tourists, filmed by no fewer than three local television crews, crowded into an old refrigerated warehouse on a pier where Oma’s mayor presided over a ceremony to slice up a 220-pound bluefin into brick-size blocks for sale.
“This is a pleasure you can only have a few times in your life,” said Toshiko Maki, 51, a homemaker from suburban Tokyo, as she popped a ruby-red cube of sashimi into her mouth.
But now the town faces a looming threat, as the number of tuna has begun dropping precipitously in recent years because of overfishing. This has given Oma another, less celebrated distinction, as a community that has stood out by calling for greater regulation of catches in a nation that has adamantly opposed global efforts to save badly depleted tuna populations.
Just a decade or two ago, each boat here could routinely catch three or four tuna a day, fishermen say. Now, they say Oma’s entire fleet of 30 to 40 boats is lucky to bring in a combined total of a half-dozen tuna in a day.
The problem, they say, is that all the fish are being taken by big trawlers that come from elsewhere in Japan, or farther out to sea from Taiwan or China. Some of these ships even use helicopters to spot schools of tuna, which they scoop up in vast nets or catch en masse with long lines of baited hooks. According to local newspapers, there have been repeated incidents of small fishing boats from Oma and other ports intentionally cutting such trawl lines.
“I’m furious at Tokyo’s bureaucrats for failing to protect our tuna,” said Hirofumi Hamahata, 69, the president of the Oma fishermen’s co-op, who has worked as a commercial fisherman since age 15. “They don’t lift a finger against the industrial fishing that just sweeps the ocean clean.”
Such flares of temper are rare in normally reserved Japan, and especially in conservative fishing communities like this one. But this is a town fiercely proud not only of its tuna, but also of how it catches them: in two-man open boats, using hand-held lines and live bait like squid.
Mr. Hamahata described catching tuna in this traditional way as a battle of wits against a clever predator that he called “the lion of the sea.” After hooking one, the contest becomes a battle of strength: he said it typically took one or two hours to pull a big tuna close enough to the boat that it could be stunned with an electric charge.
In one Hemingwayesque battle, Mr. Hamahata said he fought for 12 hours with a huge bluefin that finally broke free.
Despite such difficulties, Oma’s fishermen said they preferred their generations-old fishing method because it allowed them to catch just large, adult fish, leaving the smaller young ones to sustain local stocks.
Fishing experts say the overfishing is a result of a broader failure by the Tokyo authorities to impose effective limits on catches in its waters. Indeed, Japan, which consumes some 80 percent of the 60,000 tons of top-grade tuna caught worldwide, has lobbied hard against efforts to limit tuna catches, such as are now being proposed by European countries for the Atlantic Ocean.
“There are too many entrenched interests whose objective is maximizing profit, not sustainable use,” said Masayuki Komatsu, an expert on the fishing industry at Tokyo’s National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.
In Oma, catching a big tuna has become rare enough — and the market price high enough — to be cause for celebration. On a recent evening, family members rushed to the pier to greet one boat that had caught a 410-pound bluefin, whose tear-shaped body had to be hoisted off the boat’s deck with a forklift.
Moving quickly to gut and ice the fish to preserve its value, workers from the fishing co-op presented the footlong dorsal fin as a trophy to the captain’s wife, who said it was the first catch in 10 days. The workers said the fish would fetch more than $10,000 at Tokyo’s Tsukiji Fish Market.
“Catching a tuna is like winning the lottery,” said another fisherman, 23-year-old Takeshi Izumi, who said his boat had yet to catch a tuna this season.
To maximize prices, Oma has registered its name as a trademark that can be used only with tuna brought ashore here. This has made Oma a brand that is gaining recognition even outside Japan. In March, a sushi chef from Hong Kong paid some $50,000 to buy half of a 280-pound Oma bluefin.
The prices can be even higher: In 2001, a Japanese buyer paid a record $220,000 for a 444-pound Oma bluefin.
One unfortunate side effect, said the town’s mayor, Mitsuharu Kanazawa, was that few of Oma’s 6,200 residents can now afford their own town’s tuna. However, he said the fish have been a boon to the town’s economy, pumping in some $15 million a year from fishing and tuna-related tourism.
After a popular 2000 TV drama featured Oma, the town increased tourism by starting a three-day tuna festival every year in mid-October, which now draws 15,000 visitors a day, as well as hordes from the Japanese media, Mr. Kanazawa said.
“We Japanese have a weakness for brands,” said Ryuko Nishimura, 43, a homemaker from Kuroishi, a three-hour drive away. “It makes the tuna taste two or three times more delicious.”
But with tuna now in danger of perhaps disappearing, the mayor said the town was struggling to find another local product to keep the tourists coming.
“We tried kelp and abalone,” Mr. Kanazawa said, “but nothing has the appeal of tuna.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
Tuna Town in Japan Sees Falloff of Its Fish
By MARTIN FACKLER
OMA, Japan — Fishermen here call it “black gold,” referring to the dark red flesh of the Pacific bluefin tuna that is so prized in this sashimi-loving nation that just one of these sleek fish, which can weigh a half-ton, can earn tens of thousands of dollars.
The cold waters here once yielded such an abundance of bluefin, with such thick layers of tasty rich fat, that this tiny wind-swept seaport became Japan’s answer to California’s Napa Valley or the Brie cheese-producing region of France: a geographic location that is nearly synonymous with one of its nation’s premier foods.
So strong is the allure of Oma’s tuna that during the autumn fishing season, tens of thousands of hungry visitors descend on this remote fishing town, located on the northernmost tip of Japan’s main island of Honshu. On a recent Sunday, dozens of tourists, filmed by no fewer than three local television crews, crowded into an old refrigerated warehouse on a pier where Oma’s mayor presided over a ceremony to slice up a 220-pound bluefin into brick-size blocks for sale.
“This is a pleasure you can only have a few times in your life,” said Toshiko Maki, 51, a homemaker from suburban Tokyo, as she popped a ruby-red cube of sashimi into her mouth.
But now the town faces a looming threat, as the number of tuna has begun dropping precipitously in recent years because of overfishing. This has given Oma another, less celebrated distinction, as a community that has stood out by calling for greater regulation of catches in a nation that has adamantly opposed global efforts to save badly depleted tuna populations.
Just a decade or two ago, each boat here could routinely catch three or four tuna a day, fishermen say. Now, they say Oma’s entire fleet of 30 to 40 boats is lucky to bring in a combined total of a half-dozen tuna in a day.
The problem, they say, is that all the fish are being taken by big trawlers that come from elsewhere in Japan, or farther out to sea from Taiwan or China. Some of these ships even use helicopters to spot schools of tuna, which they scoop up in vast nets or catch en masse with long lines of baited hooks. According to local newspapers, there have been repeated incidents of small fishing boats from Oma and other ports intentionally cutting such trawl lines.
“I’m furious at Tokyo’s bureaucrats for failing to protect our tuna,” said Hirofumi Hamahata, 69, the president of the Oma fishermen’s co-op, who has worked as a commercial fisherman since age 15. “They don’t lift a finger against the industrial fishing that just sweeps the ocean clean.”
Such flares of temper are rare in normally reserved Japan, and especially in conservative fishing communities like this one. But this is a town fiercely proud not only of its tuna, but also of how it catches them: in two-man open boats, using hand-held lines and live bait like squid.
Mr. Hamahata described catching tuna in this traditional way as a battle of wits against a clever predator that he called “the lion of the sea.” After hooking one, the contest becomes a battle of strength: he said it typically took one or two hours to pull a big tuna close enough to the boat that it could be stunned with an electric charge.
In one Hemingwayesque battle, Mr. Hamahata said he fought for 12 hours with a huge bluefin that finally broke free.
Despite such difficulties, Oma’s fishermen said they preferred their generations-old fishing method because it allowed them to catch just large, adult fish, leaving the smaller young ones to sustain local stocks.
Fishing experts say the overfishing is a result of a broader failure by the Tokyo authorities to impose effective limits on catches in its waters. Indeed, Japan, which consumes some 80 percent of the 60,000 tons of top-grade tuna caught worldwide, has lobbied hard against efforts to limit tuna catches, such as are now being proposed by European countries for the Atlantic Ocean.
“There are too many entrenched interests whose objective is maximizing profit, not sustainable use,” said Masayuki Komatsu, an expert on the fishing industry at Tokyo’s National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.
In Oma, catching a big tuna has become rare enough — and the market price high enough — to be cause for celebration. On a recent evening, family members rushed to the pier to greet one boat that had caught a 410-pound bluefin, whose tear-shaped body had to be hoisted off the boat’s deck with a forklift.
Moving quickly to gut and ice the fish to preserve its value, workers from the fishing co-op presented the footlong dorsal fin as a trophy to the captain’s wife, who said it was the first catch in 10 days. The workers said the fish would fetch more than $10,000 at Tokyo’s Tsukiji Fish Market.
“Catching a tuna is like winning the lottery,” said another fisherman, 23-year-old Takeshi Izumi, who said his boat had yet to catch a tuna this season.
To maximize prices, Oma has registered its name as a trademark that can be used only with tuna brought ashore here. This has made Oma a brand that is gaining recognition even outside Japan. In March, a sushi chef from Hong Kong paid some $50,000 to buy half of a 280-pound Oma bluefin.
The prices can be even higher: In 2001, a Japanese buyer paid a record $220,000 for a 444-pound Oma bluefin.
One unfortunate side effect, said the town’s mayor, Mitsuharu Kanazawa, was that few of Oma’s 6,200 residents can now afford their own town’s tuna. However, he said the fish have been a boon to the town’s economy, pumping in some $15 million a year from fishing and tuna-related tourism.
After a popular 2000 TV drama featured Oma, the town increased tourism by starting a three-day tuna festival every year in mid-October, which now draws 15,000 visitors a day, as well as hordes from the Japanese media, Mr. Kanazawa said.
“We Japanese have a weakness for brands,” said Ryuko Nishimura, 43, a homemaker from Kuroishi, a three-hour drive away. “It makes the tuna taste two or three times more delicious.”
But with tuna now in danger of perhaps disappearing, the mayor said the town was struggling to find another local product to keep the tourists coming.
“We tried kelp and abalone,” Mr. Kanazawa said, “but nothing has the appeal of tuna.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
November 24: This Day in History: U.S. B-29s raid Tokyo
November 24, This Day in History: U.S. B-29s raid Tokyo
On this day in 1944, 111 U.S. B-29 Superfortress bombers raid Tokyo for the first time since Capt. Jimmy Doolittle’s raid in 1942. Their target: the Nakajima aircraft engine works.
Fall 1944 saw the sustained strategic bombing of Japan. It began with a reconnaissance flight over Tokyo by Tokyo Rose, a Superfortress B-29 bomber piloted by Capt. Ralph D. Steakley, who grabbed over 700 photographs of the bomb sites in 35 minutes. Next, starting the first week of November, came a string of B-29 raids, dropping hundreds of tons of high explosives on Iwo Jima, in order to keep the Japanese fighters stationed there on the ground and useless for a counteroffensive. Then came Tokyo.
The awesome raid, composed of 111 Superfortress four-engine bombers, was led by Gen. Emmett “Rosie” O’Donnell, piloting Dauntless Dotty. Press cameramen on site captured the takeoffs of the first mass raid on the Japanese capital ever for posterity. Unfortunately, even with the use of radar, overcast skies and bad weather proved an insurmountable obstacle at 30,000 feet: Despite the barrage of bombs that were dropped, fewer than 50 hit the main target, the Nakajima Aircraft Works, doing little damage. The upside was that at such a great height, the B-29s were protected from counter-attack; only one was shot down.
One Distinguished Flying Cross was awarded as a result of the raid. It went to Captain Steakley.
On this day in 1944, 111 U.S. B-29 Superfortress bombers raid Tokyo for the first time since Capt. Jimmy Doolittle’s raid in 1942. Their target: the Nakajima aircraft engine works.
Fall 1944 saw the sustained strategic bombing of Japan. It began with a reconnaissance flight over Tokyo by Tokyo Rose, a Superfortress B-29 bomber piloted by Capt. Ralph D. Steakley, who grabbed over 700 photographs of the bomb sites in 35 minutes. Next, starting the first week of November, came a string of B-29 raids, dropping hundreds of tons of high explosives on Iwo Jima, in order to keep the Japanese fighters stationed there on the ground and useless for a counteroffensive. Then came Tokyo.
The awesome raid, composed of 111 Superfortress four-engine bombers, was led by Gen. Emmett “Rosie” O’Donnell, piloting Dauntless Dotty. Press cameramen on site captured the takeoffs of the first mass raid on the Japanese capital ever for posterity. Unfortunately, even with the use of radar, overcast skies and bad weather proved an insurmountable obstacle at 30,000 feet: Despite the barrage of bombs that were dropped, fewer than 50 hit the main target, the Nakajima Aircraft Works, doing little damage. The upside was that at such a great height, the B-29s were protected from counter-attack; only one was shot down.
One Distinguished Flying Cross was awarded as a result of the raid. It went to Captain Steakley.
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