The Guardian (March 23)
“Canada said it will not send athletes to Tokyo Olympics, New Zealand said it would consider boycotting Tokyo 2020 and Australia told its olympic athletes to prepare for the games to be held next year, in 2021 – all in the wake of Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, saying postponement could be an option.”
Tags: 2021, Abe, Athletes, Australia, Boycott, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Olympics, Tokyo 2020
Forbes (February 28)
Japan’s Q4 6.3% GDP “plunge is a harsh wakeup call,” but the “talk of the Olympics being scrapped” is actually “an opportunity to refocus on what really matter. If Abe had used the last several years doing heavy lifting on reform rather than betting it all on Olympic glory, Japan would have greater endurance. It’s time Tokyo got to work actually creating a brighter future. Not just staging one.”
New York Times (February 26)
“Japan can’t handle the coronavirus. Can it host the Olympics?” The nation’s leaders have a “sense of entitlement.” This “breeds indifference and incompetence,” which was on full display during “by the unmitigated epidemiological and public relations disaster that was the saga of the Diamond Princess cruise ship.”
Tags: Coronavirus, Diamond Princess, Disaster, Entitlement, Incompetence, Indifference, Japan, Leaders, Olympics
CNN (February 17)
“Japan’s economy is flirting with recession, and the novel coronavirus could push it over the edge.” To some, a recession now looks “inevitable.”
Tags: Coronavirus, Economy, Flirting, Japan, Recession
Time (February 14)
“The number of patients infected with the COVID-19 coronavirus aboard a quarantined cruise ship docked in Yokohama, Japan has continued to rise—making the ship the largest cluster of the deadly virus outside China.” The cruise ship now “accounts for more than one third of all cases detected outside mainland China” and also boasts the highest infection rate worldwide. “Nearly 6% of the 3,711 passengers and crew members now infected.” In contrast, Wuhan’s infection rate is less than 0.3%.
Tags: China, Cluster, Coronavirus, COVID-19, Cruise ship, Infection rate, Japan, Patients, Quarantine, Wuhan, Yokohama
New York Times (February 3)
In a move “that is unheard-of for an advanced economy…. Japan now plans to build as many as 22 new coal-burning power plants—one of the dirtiest sources of electricity—at 17 different sites in the next five years, just at a time when the world needs to slash carbon dioxide emissions to fight global warming.”
Tags: Advanced, CO2, Coal burning, Dirtiest, Economy, Electricity, Japan, Power plants, Unheard-of
The Economist (January 25)
Toshiba has threatened “to block the takeover” of Toshiba Machine by Yoshiaki Murakami with a new share issue. This “should alarm anyone who cares about how Japanese firms are run.” Last year, Japanese corporations held cash in excess of ¥446 trillion, “even after they had bought back a record ¥6.5trn in shares the year before.” This “reluctance to part with cash shortchanges investors in Japan by ¥16trn a year.”
Tags: Alarm, Cash, Investors, Japan, Murakami, Share issue, Takeover, Threatened, Toshiba, Toshiba Machine
The Times (January 21)
“While China and Japan are facing increasingly acute problems of ageing societies, it is actually Europe that is grappling with a looming ‘demographic bomb.’”
Tags: Acute problems, Ageing societies, China, Demographic bomb, Europe, Japan, Looming
Japan Today (January 20)
“Japan is in the crosshairs as it seeks both to be recognized as a leader in the climate-change debate but also supports the use of what is widely regarded as a dirty fuel.” Japanese corporations, however, are ready to break with coal. They “overwhelmingly feel Japan should shift away from its dependence on coal for power generation… a Reuters poll found, further evidence that the government is out of step with the global fight against climate change.”
Tags: Climate change, Coal, Crosshairs, Dirty, Japan, Leader
Wall Street Journal (January 17)
“The 2020 Games, which officially open July 24, already may be the toughest Olympics ticket in decades, and possibly ever, ticket sellers say.” Any “Americans who want to watch them in person at the Olympics might already be out of luck.”
Tags: 2020 Games, Japan, Olympics, Out of luck, Tickets
