Daily Japan Headlines: Monday, Jan 16, 2012
Photo Source: Seattle PI.
Seattle PI: Japan Airlines debuts Hello Kitty Boeing 777
Japan Airlines unveiled a Hello Kitty-themed ‘Hellosmile’ Boeing 777-300 at Tokyo Haneda Airport on Friday, Jan. 13, 2012. JAL, TOKYO FM Broadcasting and Hello Kitty parent Sanrio Co. joined in the effort to promote cervical cancer awareness and prevention.
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Business Week: Noda Says Japan Must Heed Lessons of Europe Credit Downgrades
Europe’s fiscal situation “isn’t a house burning on the other side of the river,” Noda said on TV Tokyo Holdings Corp.’s program on Jan. 14. “We must have a great sense of crisis.”
Japan’s government, which has enjoyed borrowing costs that are around 1 percent, wouldn’t be able to manage its finances if bond yields surged to 3 percent, Noda said last week. The country risks seeing a spike in government bond yields unless it controls a debt load set to approach 230 percent of gross domestic product in 2013, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said on Nov. 28.
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Forbes: PM Noda Shows Real Leadership in Cabinet Reshuffle
Decisive was the appointment of Okada Katsuya as Deputy Prime Minister. Okada is as heavy and heavyweight—by which I mean solid on the issues and effective—as there is in the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ). He was DPJ’s president and served as the first foreign minister during the first cabinet after the DPJ took power in 2009. Noda gave to Okada, and Okada accepted, responsibility for getting through the Diet during next six months the comprehensive consumption tax increase and welfare reform package (of which only the tax increase to 10 percent by 2012 has specifics) worked out during last year.
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Wall Street Journal: Japan Cabinet Shuffle Fails to Lift Noda
Weekend polls showed the government’s approval ratings hardly changed or even down, and found most voters still oppose Mr. Noda’s plan to double the sales-tax rate from the current 5% in two stages by 2015. The Nikkei business daily found support for the cabinet up one percentage point from December, to 37%, while the Asahi Shimbun showed it down two percentage points to 29% and the Yomiuri Shimbun showed it down five percentage points to 37%.
On the government’s plan to raise the consumption tax, the Yomiuri and Nikkei polls found 55% and 56% of respondents opposed, respectively. A Kyodo News poll published Saturday found 80% against the increase if it’s not accompanied by spending cuts, including reductions in the number of lawmakers and in the salaries of civil servants.
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Wall Street Journal: Japan DPJ Tax Chief Urges Tax Increase
Unless the country shows that it’s serious about reining in its public debt, there will be a credit-rating downgrade “right before our eyes,” said Hirohisa Fujii, former finance minister and Democratic Party of Japan tax policy chief.
“Our social security is floating on borrowed money,” the veteran lawmaker told Dow Jones Newswire in an interview. “In our aging society, it’ll continue to do so. You need only look at southern Europe to understand that this will lead to more debt issuance and soaring interest rates.”
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AFP: Japan probes radioactive apartment block
Radiation levels of up to 1.24 microsieverts per hour were recorded in the building in Nihonmatsu, Fukushima, 55 kilometres (35 miles) from the crippled power plant, local authorities said Sunday.
Local media reported that 12 families were living in the block.
The three-storey condominium was constructed in July with concrete made from gravel taken from a quarry near the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power plant in April, one month after it began spewing radiation into the air and sea.
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San Francisco Chronicle: New probe vows to cut deeper in Japan nuke crisis
A newly formed investigative panel on Japan’s nuclear disaster will use its subpoena powers wisely and cut deeper into the accident than the government’s probe, the leader of the independent commission said Monday.
The panel appointed by parliament last month has gained attention here because its 10 members include outspoken critics of Japan’s nuclear policy who long ago questioned the seismic risks to the country’s 54 nuclear reactors.
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ABC News: Japan to Name Islets in Disputed Area
Japan has decided to name several uninhabited islands in a group that is also claimed by China and Taiwan, a move likely to anger the Asian neighbors.
Japan’s chief government spokesman said Monday that 39 uninhabited islands will be given names by the end of March.
The islands all are within what Japan claims as its exclusive economic zone. But four of them are in the Senkaku, or Daioyu, island group in the East China Sea, which is also claimed by Taiwan and China and have been a flashpoint in diplomatic relations.
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Wall Street Journal: Bank of Japan Downgrades View of 7 Regions
The Bank of Japan softened its assessment of regional economies as the recovery following the March disaster has stalled, but the central bank said it doesn’t see the economy immediately slipping back into a downward trend.
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Yahoo Sports: Oakland manager Melvin excited about Japan series
The Athletics and Seattle Mariners open the regular season with a two-game series at Tokyo Dome on March 28-29. Many hoped the series would feature a showdown between Matsui and countryman Ichiro Suzuki, but Melvin said the A’s likely wont be re-signing the 37-year-old free agent Matsui.
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