Japan News for February 22, 2007

This morning’s Japan-related news links:

• The Bank of Japan, the nation’s central bank, raised its key benchmark overnight borrowing rate by a quarter of a percentage point, to 0.5 percent, on Wednesday, citing signs of an expanding economy. [Link]
• U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, on a visit to Tokyo, agreed with Japanese officials that more needs to be done in a dispute over abductions of Japanese citizens by North Korea. [Link]
• A 24-hour bullying hotline for young people was launched in Nara Prefecture on Wednesday after schedule delays, meaning the hotline can now be reached from all areas of the nation. Students who phone the hotline are connected to counseling counters at the education boards of prefectural governments and major cities across Japan. [Link]
• Police on Wednesday raided the offices of a mobster group affiliated with the Yamaguchi-gumi, the nation’s largest crime syndicate, on suspicion its members were involved in the recent killing of a senior member of the rival Sumiyoshi-kai. Two men believed to be responsible for the killing of a 43-year-old senior Sumiyoshi-kai member on a street in Tokyo’s Minato Ward are still on the run. [Link]
• Seattle Mariners outfielder Ichiro is being tight-lipped about the possibility of his free agency while he concentrates on his seventh season in the major leagues. [Link]
• A Japanese whaling ship stranded off Antarctica could move on its own power within several days, an official said, but anti-whaling activists warned that environmental disaster still looms. [Link]
• A woman from China, under arrest for dumping the body of her boyfriend, which was found covered with concrete under the floor of his Tokyo home, had previously published a novel apparently depicting her own experience of marrying a Japanese man and coming to live here, it has been revealed. [Link]
• The government space agency said Wednesday the launch of an H-2A rocket to carry a spy satellite into space has been rescheduled for Saturday from Thursday, citing predicted poor weather around the Kagoshima Prefecture launch site. [Link]
• Award-winning Japanese film director Takeshi Kitano will join 34 other directors from other countries in contributing short films to a collection marking the 60th anniversary this year of the Cannes Film Festival. The film collection is slated to be shown May 20 during this year’s festival. [Link]
• What would Japanese men and women be most prepared to stand in a lengthly queue for? Ramen and theme part attractions, according to a new survey. [Link]
• Today is Takeshima Day in Shimane Prefecture: The San-in Chuo Shimpo Newspaper has run an article on American Gerry Bever’s research related to the disputed islets. [Link]

Afternoon update:

• Naoto Kan, the second-in-command in the largest opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), has come under mounting pressure to run in the upcoming Tokyo gubernatorial race in a bid to unseat Gov. Shintaro Ishihara. [Link]
• A couple in their 60s were found dead in Honjo, Saitama Prefecture, on Wednesday night, police officials said. The couple were believed to have been beaten to death, and their house had been ransacked. [Link]
• New Zealand is asking the United States to make available a US Coast Guard icebreaker to take pictures of a Japanese whaling vessel disabled in the Ross Sea near Antarctica. In addition, US State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey said US officials were worried about the safety of the Japanese crew aboard the Nisshin Maru and any possible environmental problems that might result from a fire that occurred aboard the ship a week ago. [Link]
• A Nihon University medical student has been arrested for building and detonating a small bomb in his faculty’s basement. The blast damaged the wooden shelf on which the device was placed, but there were no reports of any other damage or any injuries. [Link]
• An increase of 32,000 newborns in 2006 from the previous year pushed up Japan’s fertility rate to at least 1.3, according to a preliminary report released by the government Wednesday. [Link]
• Dororo, which has spent four straight weeks at the top of Japan’s box office and earned 2.5 billion yen in box office revenue, will soon have 2 sequels going into production. [Link]
• The Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Los Angeles-based Jewish advocacy group, has expressed concern that “a new wave of conspiratorial anti-Semitic works could be on the way” after the recent release of a book by Japanese publisher Tokuma Shoten Publishing Co. The center urged a stop to sales of the book “Niche wa minuiteita Yudaya-Kirisutokyo ‘sekai shihai’ no karakuri” (The mechanism of Judeo-Christian ‘control of the world’ that Nietzsche saw through), which it described as a “patently false and hateful material.” [Link]