DoLittleBeLate comments

On top of the entertainment value of the "island news", it is an unanticipated bonus how the hotheads here keep mixing Senkaku/Diayou/Tiaoyutai and Liancourt Rocks/Takeshima/Dokdo together. Shall we think of a joint name for China, Taiwan, South Korea and Russia as well? Let's call them "The Great Western Satans", shall we?

The Japanese Emperor is not a political figure in any way. His apology means nothing else than he as an individual apologizes.

Anyway, apology without real regret should be ignored since it has no value. If Japanese want to remember what happened in WW2, they should remember EVERYTHING that happened in WW2. Historical facts are not open for editing nor debating.

Japanese facists are doing a good job in proving that the Chinese and Korean points of view are the correct ones. There is no dignity in Yasukuni, only brutality.

War crimes must be remembered.

I'm sure the efficiency of the Chinese government to protect Japanese nationals reflects Japanese governments desire to protect foreign nationals, as was well demonstrated by the incident involving a certain South Korean national, J-coppers and a pack of uncontrollable vicious animals.

Ossan, you just keep hiding behind U.S's back, after creating the problems in the first place. China, South Korea, Russia, they all have more friends in the area than Japan. And how is Japan making up all the troubles it causes to U.S? Clock's ticking, patience running out. You really believe any fleet will come to you? Because of ink on a piece of paper? Paid by who? That is just an international treaty, and everybody knows exactly in what way Japan respects international treaties.

Japan really should look into making more friends around the neighbourhood instead of talking big and then cowering behind the back of somebody who has wider interests in peace in the area. World gets fast tired of the antiques of eternal jr high school boys.

Tairitsuiken, don't try to cloud up the issue. We are not talking about bruised egos and harsh words here. These children were physically tortured. Broken bones, burn injuries inflicted. They are serious crimes that bring prison time to those of adult age everywhere in the world, and nobody thinks differently.

But this level of severity makes the criminal's age unimportant. Their upbringing has failed so completely that no amount of "understanding" is going to stop the degradation. Only fear of severe reprecussions can keep these vicious animals in societal behaviour. They need to be taught lessons before they are handed death sentences when they do continue their behaviour as adults. Indeed the best way to confront bullies is to beat them back hard and never stop.

Teachers cannot be trusted. They'd rather throw children to the wolves like they were done at, and since J-cops have nothing better to do (I know they should have, but these are J-cops), they should earn their food. I say jail time to torturers. They already ruined their own future with their emotionless sociopathic life, no need to ruin the futures of their victims as well. Anyway, bullies can't actually feel anything, so why pat their heads?

Nothing civilized in anything these mentally unstable Japanese facists may come up. Always overreacting on silly things.

Gaijinfo beat me to it - this has "Battle Royale" written all over it. Bunch of eternal jr high school kids mucking about when there are much more pressing issues in Japan, this is just sad.

How about using 10% of that energy for preventing nuclear waste from entering children's food?

Thomas, this indeed happens everywherw, but it does NOT happen to normal ordinary people. This only happens to low-life scum who have "better things to do" than look after their own children.

Japan needs the illusion of a missile umbrella so that they can start shooting their own weapons of mass destruction into superior economic powers.

Americans must make clear that these right-wing facists have no place in the Pacific politics because they are mentally unstable lot, according to pretty much everybody. Japanese diplomat corps must be forced to do their jobs without the possibility of resorting to mindless destruction of innocents, just like peace-loving countries are doing already.

Changing a Japanese system has historically amounted to "hitting some guy with a hammer". They won't acknowledge that there was a problem with the 13 year old. You think they'll acknowledge it now? Will it matter to the abuse victims?

Pranavk, Jefflee. If a mere language skill is enough to take down your "culture", it certainly isn't strong enough to survive and should be allowed to fade away.

My native culture has grown ever stronger in my mind and heart since I moved to Japan, even though I speak Japanese plus two others on top of my own native tongue. Forced upkeeping of any culture is rubbish. If it's strong enough to survive, it will do so.

Japan has the unfortunate culture of letting the obviously guilty to make any excuse imaginable, and it is considered impolite to publicly mock their pathetic and infantile attempts to avoid responsibility.

Underage or not, he knows he did wrong, and he has no intention to take responsibility of his vicious, brutal and barbaric behaviour. Again - there is a medical term to describe the personality of this criminal.

All the Japanese store "experiences" are beautiful generalizations (perhaps from a manual) devoid of any actual examples, and all the western "experiences" are somebody's chosen extreme cases generalized to whole cultures. After living in western countries for 35 years before coming to Japan, I do not recognize a single western shopping experience from this article. Despite having a western name, I find it hard to believe that the writer has ever been to a western country.

Sure, the non-racist store clerks in Japan offer a wide smile and accept your payment (if cash), but one can't expect too much hospitality in Japan. The best hospitality I've received was from a 300 yen ramen joint in Shinjuku.

Nuclear-free future of Japan won't be a threat to world's third economy because by 2030 Japan won't be anywhere near the top. But Edano speaks truth - renewables have stronger developing future markets than nuclear energy. You don't need to keep kids inside and eat relabelled food when a solar panel breaks.

Equating nuclear energy and economic advancement is a fallacy. It did nothing to stop or even slow down Japan's economic depression from the 80's to the present.

Badge213, all that data has been in my skin a lot longer than that. As I clearly expressed, I am not complaining that the data is in that chip. It has already made my life at European airports a lot easier.

What I'm protecting is my right to keep it away from any other surveillance database that is not absolutely necessary (the "need" defined openly and truthfully) to identify me at airports only and the security of air travel. Japan's poor ethics combined with poor understanding of network security against inside abusers and outside hackers makes this a human rights violation waiting to happen. Then again, this is Japan, who's going to notice many more.

Harry_Gatto is right at first, there is no reason to assume facial recognition is not being used already. There are enough Japanese companies working on it to fill a whole section in tech expos.

However, claiming that "only criminals have reason to be afraid" is misleading and false. What are the rules for handling this information? Who is monitoring it's use? Who decides if, when and into what those rules will be changed later?

Any right you give up now, you give up forever. Your children will never regain that right. They are going to ask why, and they will know it was you.

I'm not hiding anything - I'm protecting.

“If people keep saying (nuclear energy) is for having nuclear weapons capability, that is not good,” Suzuki said. “It’s not wise. Technically it may be true, but it sends a very bad message to the international community.

Messenger doesn't write the message. What other countries see free speech as problematic? North Korea, China, Syria... What happy rich paradises they are.

It seems that even the pacifistic constitution is not enough to hold the Japanese dogs of war in check for long. So nice of them for declaring every nuclear power plant in Japan a legitimate military target. That make mass annihilation with mere handful of conventional weapons so much easier. Well, history teaches (to all but Japanese children, as we all know) what options the world has for Japan if those dogs get beyond mere talk. Again.

The world welcomes truly peace-loving Japan. Too bad that's not all of Japan.

He hung up after waiting only 15 hours? Yeah, him don't take no s#it from nobody, yo!

Like MasterBape said, Japanese are proud of their culture, no matter what it contains. Low standards.

Sure, bullying exists in all countries. I see no excuse there to let it continue anywhere. And I'm pretty sure "funeral rehearsals" and "suicide practices" are quite unique to Japan.

The three Otsu devils are said to feel "not having done anything wrong". There is a medical term for that, y'know. And now they're allowed to walk among our children. I really don't think so.

also, plenty of cops in other countries

Seriously?!? That's your excuse for raising your arms and saying "shouganai"? Who's following who's example here? What on earth do you think you'll achieve by setting your standards as low as possible, as is so acceptable in Japan?

I'm sure the whole incident is "highly regrettable" and he will be "duly disciplined". In the fullness of time. When the stars are aligned just so. The department cleaning lady (from some employee dispatch company) will issue an apologetic regret that the whole incident was misunderstood by the public, that should wrap it up.

Trustworthy jcops...

Oh and werent the vast majority of 9/11 terrorists Saudi nationals..

Well, their paper passports that emerged from the infernal metal-vaporizing fireball indeed indicated so.

Obama is in trouble. Human life is not worth going to war for, and Syria has no oil. What to do, what to do...

making it easier for U.S. forces to respond to contingencies in areas away from Okinawa, such as Senkaku

Ospreys will never carry American troops to anything in connection with the Diaoyu. Those islands are fool's errands, everybody konws that. If Japan wants to fight, Japan will fight alone, and rebuild it's ashes alone. Other nations have functional diplomatic corps to deal with international friction, Japan should look into that.

Dennis, you don't like news? Then stop reading them. News blackout is only good for facists hoping to go against the public.

I hope they find loving caretakers for the 2-year old, who had her whole family taken away by a selfish childish freak criminal. He didn't think he'd get the death penalty? Too late to learn now.

While these warmongers and criminals are denying history, the neighbouring countries are not. They know what Japan did and what it's capable of doing, and so does the whole world. The U.S - Japan security alliance is not there to defend Japan. It is there to defend its neighbours. 70 years is obviously not long enough to weed out the aggressiveness out of Japanese.

stoking concerns that turmoil overseas is damaging recovery in the world’s third-largest economy.

How original. Geez, is there not one single mirror in Japan?

Japan equates prosperity with concrete. There is practically no intelligent urban planning, and massive amounts of energy is wasted by using improper building materials. It is quite possible to reduce the Japan summer heat with proper building. It seems that the rest of the world, including China, have to show Japan how it's done (http://pluris2010.civil.uminho.pt/Actas/PDF/Paper605.pdf)

AC is believed to be the most efficient cooling method. It is the most consumptive, that's all. Air is a heat insulator, its cooling and transferring takes a lot of energy, and it only works in isolated areas. One really should broaden one's mind in order to stay cool.

Keep the sunshine outside, don't block it with something that is inside (such as curtains), those can get pretty hot, and you don't want hot things inside. Reflective sheets that are glued to the windows are sold in 100円 shops, they reflect 90% of incoming energy (don't know if that's true, but a drop from 43℃ to 35℃ was quite evident). The straw mats hanging outside are also efficient.

Hot surfaces heat up a lot of air, so removing that heat via i.e. vaporization of water is very effective. Why use a hair dryer after the cold shower, wet hair it will dry up very fast and will cool the body at the same time. You put hokkairo on your back/neck/feet/armpits in winter, so put cold gel bags (wet towels) in there during summer. Showering even just legs is very efficient. Open windows, feel the direction of the wind and position your fans so that they don't stop the natural air flow, but increase and spread it.

And for next summer, get in shape, as muscle mass and iron constitution helps with the heat. I also use AC, but only at minimal power consumption because there are so many other ways to cool off.

I have a few Japanese therapeutists and psychologist in my circle of acquaintances. NONE of them got any valuable education for their profession in Japan. ALL of them have degrees, careers and families in other countries. You might get a diagnosis in Japan, but not help. Never help.

Mommy dearest was ashamed of her daughter in distress and hanged the rope as ijime, right? This assumption is as valid as those who say parents just tried to help her. They would never admit using their J-school ijime techniques on their own daughter, now would they?

The demonstrations are actually a sign of healthy people. Wouldn't body give less and less if the head kept abusing it, and eventually respond in pain?

Schopenhauer, is there nothing that is more important to you than the vagueness of "national economy"?

National economy is not important. It means less and less for more and more people. Japanese people are getting so much less for it than the nations who can balance their lives better. Lose the zaibatsu and salaryman cultures and you'll see.

Hope and a healthy dose of denial got Japan it's biggest man-made disaster so far. Should have used reason and logic instead.

This quote doesn't make any sense.