Japan News for April 30, 2007

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    Today’s Japan-related news links:

    • South Korea and Japan will once again wrangle over the name for the body of water that divides them at the International Hydrographic Organization conference that opens in Monaco on May 7. [Link]
    • The volume of Japan’s crude oil imports from Iran in March recorded a 64.9% growth compared with the previous month, and now accounts for 14.2% of Japan’s overall crude oil imports, making Iran the 3rd largest oil exporter to that country. [Link]
    • Japan and Saudi Arabia agreed on Saturday to build a broad economic and strategic partnership, saying a “just, comprehensive solution” to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians was needed. [Link]
    • Twenty-one people including small children were injured Saturday in Tokyo when tents and a trampoline came down at an event square, apparently affected by violent winds. [Link]
    • The agreement by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and U.S. President George W. Bush to share information about their countries’ free trade agreement talks with third parties apparently marked a first step toward an eventual FTA between Tokyo and Washington. [Link]
    • Social stigma is preventing thousands of Japanese women who served occupying U.S. troops in official brothels from coming forward to seek compensation, an activist with the Tokyo-based Violence against Women in War Network said Saturday. [Link]
    • The Yomiuri Shimbun’s Tokyo head office and the Yomiuri Shimbun group failed to declare about 479 million yen in taxable income in the five years to March 31, 2006: The Tokyo Regional Taxation Bureau ordered the nation’s largest newspaper to pay some 175 million yen in back and punitive taxes. [Link]
    • A special train decorated with illustrations of popular animals kept at Asahikawa Zoo in Hokkaido began operations between the prefectural capital of Sapporo and Asahikawa on Saturday. [Link]
    • Blogger Ampontan criticizes western media coverage of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s visit to America in an entry entitled, “Eyes wide shut: The media and the Abe-Bush press conference.” [Link]
    • Wondering if your dog or cat is stressed? Just stick a special patch on the bottom of its paw and you’ll be able to tell, according to a Japanese company. [Link]
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