Designer comments

"The tough stance against Chubu Electric's plant reflects the environment ministry's growing concern that Japan risks missing commitments made under the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement"

Risk missing commitments or risk obliterating the country with another nuclear disaster. Is the choice really so difficult? What other alternatives are being seriously looked at?

Come on Japan, step into the 90s

Unbelievable and shameful in this day and age. Why Japan would want to fly in the face of the whole rest of the World is quite inconceivable. I agree withthe comments above that this is just mindless defiance and the "scientific research" thing is a total sham

"but there is a kind of logic behind it"............

Are you serious? What a ridiculous statement......what kind of journalism is this?

Would have been nice if there had been at least a note saying what this was awarded for........

So why do sentences have a mixture of kanji and hiragana? Because hiragana gets used for grammatical particles and modifiers.

OK well that makes it very clear then! What on earth are grammatical particles and modifiers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So happy for them and sad for their losses Hope that the new child will have a long, happy and peace filled life.

i don't normally comment on other people's posts but i have to say what a totally insensitive and irrelevant comment being made by yildaray

A miricale indeed. Our hearts bleed for the people of Kyushu and Japan

I imagine that the pressure to run the train on time was a major factor here. During my first trip to Tokyo I helped rescue a toddler who had fallen through the gap between the platform and a Hiyabusa Shinkansen. During that incident the train staff were visibly more concerned about keeping to schedule than the wellbeing of the child and mother.

""I asked for necessary actions to be taken as we must not justify any act of violence,” Abe said."

I can't actually think of anything much more violent than harpooning a whale and letting it slowly die.

Just exactly what research is claimed to be being undertaken here?

Quite apart from any other arguments blatantly proceeding with this killing and the killing of dolphins, both of which would appear to fly in the face of World opinion, can hardly advance the cause of attempting to promote Japan as a great place to visit.

There have been many things through the history of civilization (cannibalism, head shrinking, slavery, apartheid etc) which could be claimed to be cultural or traditional but which become generally become unacceptable to most people over a period of time.....

I'm confused by this article. On Friday the BBC World Service reported that India is opening new coal powered power stations at the rate of one per month and that their coal minister was justifying this by saying that developed countries had polluted as they initially developed. Now according to this article India would appear to be at the forefront in pushing for environmental change. Anyone any clarification on this?

“Today we can remember the past, but we can also honor the change through reconciliation between people”. one hopes in the fullness of time that this will also pertain to relations between Japan, Korea and China

Fantastic photo, Japan's pageantry is amazing. Some description of the event would be welcome.

Positive news is good!

In the interest of everyone I hope that these meeting can be fruitful and that focus can be on future cooperation rather than the bitter past. Perhaps a vain hope but a hope nonetheless.

Total madness. If the people don't want it how can this happen in a democracy.................Reduce electric consumption and keep all the nuclear power turned off.

"Of course, the WHO and IOC want us to ban smoking completely. But frankly speaking, this kind of very rapid, dynamic and drastic measure will not suit the current situation of Tokyo"

The bans that wer rapidly intruduced in may other places (LA, Ottawa etc) were rapid, ahead of their time, and very unpopular with many people at the time. That Paris and Ireland (two places where smoking is still rampant in the general public) were amongst the first places in Europe is even more amazing. The reality is that all of these places are so much nicer to visit now that you can go into a restaurant or other public place and know that your time there is not going to be ruined by second hand smoke from selfish smokers who don't give a damn who else smokes their smoke. Japan is soooooo way behind the rest of the civilized world in this department and needs to catch up. it is now shocking for westerners to go into a restaurant in Japan and be met with a barrage of smoke. Ban smoking in public places, get it over with, improve the quality of life in public places in Japan, and stop harming employees who work in these environments. Smoking kills. Everyone knows this.

Madness. Another set-back for "recovery through tourism"

"Laying the foundations"?? Did I miss something? Has a new design been completed by a selected designer, given a building permit and tendered out?

Over the history of the human race there have been many things which have been considered "traditional" and part of a country's "culture", including things like canibalism, head-shrinking, human sacrifices and the like. Generally as "civilization" progresses some of these things become generally unacceptable to the general population and are pressured or forced out of existence. Currently controversial things include commercial whaling, dolphin killing and bull fighting in Spain. The weight of World opinion would clearly seem to be against commercial whaling and dolphin killing, these are mammals after all, and therefore anyone who makes a stand for these things will inevitably suffer severe criticism from the international community. Japan has so many things to offer visitors, it is such a shame that issues such as these are continually thrown into the spotlight, far from attracting more visitors things like this turn a great number of people off. The number of visitors quoted actually seems relatively few for a country with a population of over 100 million, it would be interesting to see some comparisons with places like Lomdon and Paris. Throwing controversial issues continually I peoples' faces is hardly likely to do anything for tourism

I don't know the criteria for selection and from the various comments these seem to be debatable. However what I do know is that I've spent the last four years reading works by various Japanese literary notables and with the possible exception of Kawabata, Murakami is by far the most readable and engrossing of all of the authors that I have read. By far. Currently on my sixth of his novels and as with the other five once I have started them I find it difficult to put them down.

I don't know enough about this situation to have an opinion, however echoing comments made by some others I can offer the following insight into the life of a creative person. Designers of visual designs are typically design junkies who consume an inordinate amount of visual information all the time. Often this material is somehow vaguely lodged in the subconscious without a specific visual record. Also in the visual arts it is almost impossible to create anything which is totally unique, totally original and which has no reference to anything else that ever existed. I honestly can't believe that any designer would deliberately copy another designers work, especially for such a high profile project like this and it is virtually impossible in the creative arts to invent anything which can't be demonstrated to be similar to something else if you search hard enough. My feeling is that those who choose to condemn this designer are being unduly harsh without much knowledge of creative processes.

.......... How about a drive to use less electricity........just a thought

This makes no sense at all. According to numerous articles on this subject the people of Japan do not want nuclear power stations but the government is committed to turning them back on for economic reasons. But even at best they can only produce 25pc of the total power.

Nuclear materials are dangerous beyond anything else because you can't destroy them. And when accidents occur the cost to human life is incalculable. Designers and humans in general make mistakes in their work so how can there ever be a "safe" nuclear installation. Will it take another Fukushima to end this madness.

Oh and isn't Japan desperately trying to increase tourism to the country, turning back on nuclear power stations will really help this!!!!

In Europe and North America the copyright in artistic works automatically belongs to the creator of the work, trademark or no trademark.

A moving story indeed. On this of al days, instead of the persistent bickering and negative comments, let's look forward in a spirit of cooperation and humility, and let's hope that these situations never again arise for any reason. we are after all all human beings whatever our race.

This situation is so hard for a foreigner to understand.

It is repeatedly stated that most people in Japan do not want nuclear power, who would after Fukushima. It is also repeatedly stated that the government is totally committed to nuclear power, usually this is stated as being for economic reasons (albeit that nuclear power actually provides a relatively small proportion of the total power required).

However in the most recent election the government that wants to reintroduce nuclear energy was overwhelmingly returned to power.

Am I missing something here?