In this edition of TPR News, we look at Tokyo Governor Ishihara Shintaro’s bid for re-election, Japan’s drive to become a permanent member of the UN Security Council, Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhiaoxing’s meeting with Shinzo Abe, and what’s happening to bullies.

Politics

Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhiaoxing met with Prime Minister Abe on Friday and offered China’s help to Japan in resolving the issue of Japanese abducted by North Korea, saying, “I fully understand Japan’s concerns and would like to offer support as much as possible.”

On a less cordial note, Li asked for patience and seriousness in dealing with a dispute over natural gas rights that both countries claim when Abe expressed displeasure of China’s development of gas fields in Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

The Six Party Talks have dominated foreign policy lately, but, rather than touch on such a complex event here, we ask our readers to listen to the forthcoming Seijigiri #18, in which Ken and Garrett will do their best to dissect the talks and figure out who actually got what in the agreement that emerged.

Tokyo Governor Ishihara Shintaro has apparently decided to go it alone. According to “an LDP member in Tokyo,” in mid-January, the LDP decided to offer Ishihara the party’s support in the upcoming Tokyo gubernatorial election after being approached by one of Ishihara’s contacts. However, last Friday, Ishihara denied that the LDP had made such an offer, saying: “I have been working without any party affiliation. I want to keep that as my principle. I will fight in my own way.” Some observers believe that Ishihara may be trying to distance himself from the increasingly unpopular Abe administration. The Asahi Shimbun hints that this story may not yet be over, writing: “A senior LDP Tokyo metropolitan assembly member suggested…that Ishihara, haunted by his own scandals, may eventually seek LDP support.”

Ishihara’s road to a third term may be a bit easier now that a potential heavyweight challenger seems to no longer be looming on the horizon. DPJ executives announced on Friday that they will not support a run by acting party leader Naoto Kan. Former Miyagi governor Shiro Asano had been asked to run, but has not yet decided whether or not he will.

On February 18, the Yomiuri published an editorial entitled Japan still far from permanent UNSC seat, detailing the difficulties that Japan faces in trying to achieve this goal. In a recent interview published here at TPR, Jun Yanagi, Counselor to the Japanese Embassy of Canada, told Alex Pappas that, “Since [1945] the world has changed a lot. The number of UN Member States has increased and power has shifted a lot. So unless this Security Council is modernized to meet these new challenges, it may not continue to function effectively.”

The Yomiuri’s piece highlights the actions of the Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG) on reform of the U.N. Security Council, which met for the first time in 2007 last week. The group is comprised of ambassadors from Chile, Croatia, Cyprus, the Netherlands, and Tunisia. Japan’s ambassador to the UN, Kenzo Oshima, attended the meeting and stressed that Japan is still considering active ideas in order to gain its inclusion as a permanent member of the body. The sentiment among members of the OEWG was that of the four nations currently seeking permanent member status (Japan, Brazil, India, and Germany), Japan remains the strongest force pushing for such reform. The United States, however, was the only permanent member of the Security Council to not speak at the OEWG meeting, leading many observers to doubt that the US strongly supports Japan’s bid. Ambassador Oshima expressed the opinion that if reform is not achieved by the beginning of this summer, it could be some time before another chance arises.

According to the Yomiuri, LDP members of Tokyo’s Shinagawa Ward Assembly “have attached sales receipts for comics, detective novels, and even pornography to their funding reports for political research expenses.” Although the assembly does not require members to list the titles of books and periodicals that are purchased for political use. Ward Assembly members were able to discern the titles by examining the ISBN of the items purchased. According to an assembly document, the publications that had been purchased included 11 crime novels, two comics of four-frame cartoons, three comics for boys, four pornographic novels, a book of auto reviews, handbooks on choosing shochu, and manuals on the game of Go. Yasumichi Sudo, the LDP’s chief secretary in the assembly, told the newspaper: “We should have checked how the funds had been used more strictly. As it’s sure the funds had been used for pornographic novels and other unrelated books, we’d like to return the money to the assembly after investigating the receipts closely.”

For those who follow Japanese politics, Adam Richards has published two recent can’t-miss pieces at the Mutant Frog Travelogue. First is his “Highlights from the Diet — Lower House Finance Committee, Feb 12-16 2007,” in which he details the Lower House Budget Comittee, Prime Minister Abe’s reactions to a recent New York Times piece, and the talking-to given to Finance Minister Koji Omi, who brought his daughter along on official business (meetings toward setting up the Okinawa Institute for Science and Technology), with public funds paying for at least a portion of her expenses.

In the second piece, entitled “LDP Relying on Washed-up Celebrities to Lure Upper House Voters,” Adamu introduces us to some of the more colorful characters who are set to run for seats in the Upper House in the upcoming election. One of those profiled is the signer who recorded the Japanese-language version of Ricky Martin’s “La Vida Loca,” and the other is former biker gang leader Keisuke Yoshino. Head over to Mutant Frog to learn more about these characters.

Business and the Economy

A recent book on the life of Princess Masako has caused quite the stir in Japan. After the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Imperial Household Ministry demanded that author Ben Hills apologize for what they called “disrespectful descriptions, distortions of facts and judgmental assertions with audacious conjectures and coarse logic,” Mr Hill responded by telling Kyodo News:

I regard this as an attempt by the Japanese government to suppress and censor my book and I think it is absolutely outrageous. There is nothing to apologise for. In fact, there is only one person in this saga that deserves an apology and that’s Princess Masako. I think the Kunaicho (Imperial Household Agency) should apologise to her for bullying her into a state of nervous breakdown.

Although the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has declined to say which portions of the book it finds to be factually incorrect, the Imperial Household Agency has posted “A letter from the Imperial Household Agency on “Princess Masako” (Ben Hills)” on its website. The letter, which is signed by Grand Chamberlain to His Majesty the Emperor Makoto Watanabe, details the Emperor and Empress’s charity activities and claims that they have been misrepresented by Hills, although no mention is made of Masako. The letter ends with a series of questions:

If all of what the Emperor and Empress do were meaningless formalities, as you seem to imply, why more than seventy-five percent of people constantly support the Imperial Family as it is in public opinion polls? Also, why tens of thousands of local people are willing to come out to welcome the Emperor and Empress along the roads they take wherever they go in the country?

Last Friday, Japanese publishing house Kodansha, which had been set to release the Japanese-language translation of Hills’ book, announced that it would cancel the release. A Foreign Ministry official denied that Kodansha had been contacted by the ministry itself. Kodansha editor Kazunobu Kakishima placed the blame squarely with Hills: “We have come to the conclusion that it is impossible to maintain trustworthy relations with the author and thus we were forced to cancel the book.”

Many speculate that the offending portions of Hills’ book include passages where he asserts that Masako’s child, Princess Aiko, may have been conceived by in vitro fertilization. As Asia Media points out, such claims were commonly made in the foreign press following Aiko’s birth, but not picked up by Japan’s domestic media.

For those interested in what some of the Japan bloggers have to say about the issue, Japan Probe ran a piece earlier today with links to pieces at GlobalTalk 21, durf.org, and Tokyo Mango.

So why is this story in the business section? Because it’s all about the marketing.

In its monthly assessment of the economy, the Cabinet Office announced on Monday that it had no changes in its overall evaluation of economic conditions. The announcement comes on the eve of the Bank of Japan’s February policy meeting, where the BOJ’s governors will decide whether or not to raise Japan’s benchmark interest rates from their current 0.25%. The report essentially said that the economy continues to recover, despite weaknesses in private consumption. Naoki Iizuka, senior economist at Mizuho Securities said:

The government is indirectly and intentionally sending a message to the Bank of Japan that the economy isn’t strong enough to withstand another rate hike. This clear message will be a headwind for the bank to raise rates.

Japan Economy News has pointed out that compared to last month, there seems to be less political pressure on the Bank of Japan, at least in terms of overt statements by government officials. The few comments that have been made, by Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki and Finance Minister Hiroko Ota, have asserted that the Bank of Japan will make its own decisions.

Steel Partners, a US-based hedge fund, said last week it may launch a tender offer to raise its stake in Japanese brewer Sapporo Holdings from about 18.5 percent to 66.6 percent at an estimated cost of 150 billion yen ($1.3 billion). To date, Steel Partners owns stakes of at least five percent in 28 different Japanese companies, with a total investment estimated at 299 billion yen. Some of the companies in its portfolio include Citizen Watch Co. (10.52% ownership), Bull-Dog Sauce Co.(10.15%), Nissin Food Products Co. (9.28%), Brother Industries Ltd. (9.19%), and the Kikkoman Corp. (5.65%).

Late last week, television news in Japan, along with the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, was abuzz with reports that Japan’s No. 1 beer maker Asahi Breweries was considering a white-knight bid to block the investment fund’s takeover of Sapporo. On Saturday, however, Sapporo spokesman Tatsuya Komatsu denied that the company was considering a tie-up deal with Asahi, Kirin, or any other domestic brewery.

At this point, what’s really going on is anyone’s guess: four days ago, Forbes published an article with the headline, “Japan’s Sapporo proposes new anti-takeover measures as US fund mulls offer,” and just yesterday it published the headline, “Japan’s Asahi Breweries to offer tie-up to Sapporo,” which of course runs counter to the article published the day before, in which Sapporo denied that any such deal was in the works. With Sapporo’s annual general meeting coming up on March 29, it should be an eventful next month for the company.

It should be noted that Sapporo and Asahi were formed when the Dai Nippon Beer Co. was broken up in 1949. Dai Nippon Beer’s original factory, which was located in Sumida Ward, Tokyo, was destroyed in the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923.

Society

In TPR’s first sports report, we are pleased to announce that two friends of TPR, Alex Oke and Adam Gordon, completed the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday, which was run in an icy rain by Adam, Alex, and 29,998 others, including men’s winner Daniel Njenga of Kenya.

Longtime Japan resident and entrepreneur Terrie Lloyd brings up some food for thought in his most recent editorial, Monitoring foreign residents in Japan. Lloyd astutely points out some of the governmental policy contradictions that exist in Japan, and how short-sighted policy decisions can have negative long-term impacts. After detailing the proposed elements of what may become the government’s new immigration policy, Lloyd comes to this conclusion:

Either the current government is becoming xenophobic, and this is being manifested as tighter controls OR maybe they’re preparing the way to substantially increasing the immigrant population. We would like to subscribe to the second theory. However, with the difficulties that minimum language and services rules will impose, it may happen that no foreigner in their right mind will want to come live here after that!

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At 4:15 p.m. on October 11th of last year, five junior high school boys attacked their classmate, Mori Keisuke, in a bathroom at school and attempted to take his pants off. This may have been the last straw for the boy, frequently bullied according to police. Later that evening, he was dead, having hanged himself in a shed at his family’s home after writing four notes saying,

“I was being bullied, and I can’t live any longer,” and “Bullying is the reason. Good-bye.”

Keisuke’s suicide was one of many that occurred last Fall, when it came to light that school boards and school administrators had been covering up the problem of bullying-related suicides. How many were pushed over the edge before him is unclear, but being investigated.

What gives Keisuke’s suicide an added significance is that prefectural police in Fukuoka delivered papers on three second-year students who bullied Keisuke to prosecutors and referred two 13-year-olds to a child consultation center. In Japan, children must be at least 14 years old at the time of a crime to be prosecuted for it, the Criminal Law and Juvenile Law having been revised six years ago after a spate of juvenile crimes.

All five boys have expressed remorse over the result of their actions and police made a point of saying they sought not to punish the boys, but to ensure their proper future development.

Last Word

This is a positive step, and shows further progress in the area of dealing with bullying, Prime Minister Abe having made the rather obvious decision of advocating the suspension of recidivist bullies recently.

It is only a step, though. The prosecution of the three bullies whoc an be prosecuted should be carried out as aggressively as any other criminal prosecution and their sentence should be as strict as the law allows. Driving a classmate to suicide through relentless, malicious physical and mental assault is not the sort of thing for which adults can give a boy a stern talking-to and hope he’s learned his lesson.

In addition to ensuring the proper development of children, those in positions of authority have a responsibility to send a message, not only to bullies, but to other adults that such behavior unacceptable.

What about the teachers and principals who ignored the plight of victims such as Keisuke? What about the school board members who covered up what was going on? What about teachers who have treated victims as nuisances or even gone so far as to participate in bullying?

It is right to take care of bullies, as they probably have their own problems, but it is not enough. For a message to sink in, adults involved in such situations need to be shown in the strongest possible terms that defending their charges and dealing with a potentially life-threatening problem is not only right, but not optional.

Parents who neglect or abuse children are now prosecuted, there is no reason why school officials or teachers should be exempt.

All parties involved - those who bullied and those complicit in its continuation, need be taught, the hard way, that, in effect, killing someone is not something one lives down.

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