Japan is beginning construction today, January 12, of a new base intended to be used primarily by the US military on the uninhabited island of Mageshima in Kagoshima Prefecture, despite years of resistance to the controversial plan and a questionable process by which the island was acquired by the government.
SEALDs, short for Students Emergency Action for Liberal Democracy, was a student activist organization in Japan that provided an important spark to the large-scale protests against then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s 2015 “Legislation for Peace and Security” (i.e. the Abe War Law), deemed by the vast majority of Japan’s legal scholars in the field to be unconstitutional.
The Covid-19 crisis became a dominating issue for the world, and Japan is no exception. This is a timeline of the events so far.
Throughout its nearly eight years in power, the Abe administration pressed forward with all its might to build a new US airbase at Henoko, Okinawa.
A roundup of the most significant news stories from Japan reported in the first half of August 2020.
On June 15, Defense Minister Taro Kono announced a suspension of the deployment of the Aegis Ashore missile interception system—a suspension that ten days later became a cancellation. The progression from deciding to deploy Aegis Ashore, to cancelling it, to considering alternatives, reveals policy formation fraught with dysfunction.
A roundup of the most significant news stories from Japan reported in the last half of June 2020.
This SNA Speakeasy features Hideki Yoshikawa on the theme of “Opposing Henoko Base in Nago, Okinawa.”
A roundup of the most significant news stories from Japan reported in the first half of June 2020.
A roundup of the most significant news stories from Japan reported in the last half of April 2020.
