Light Up London

19th August 2012

Action for Japan UK is going to screen the documentary, ‘LIGHT UP NIPPON.’ This is a documentary about the firework performance that was held along the coast of Japan last year in order to commemorate the victims of the Great East Earthquake, and to provide aid for the affected people.

Entrance Fee
£10 (early bird TICKETS:)

£15 (at the door)

All proceeds go to LIGHT UP NIPPON and Action for Japan UK.

On March 11th, 2011, the Great East Japan Earthquake happened. In the face of a perceived unprecedented disaster and the massive casualties, everyone across Japan was bending their head down, wondering how Japan can be reconstructed. However, there was a man who kept looking up. He came up with the idea of a firework performance at the ten affected areas across the coast of East Japan. Although this performance was thought to be impossible to happen, it was the passion of one person and the local people’s zest for living that made this idea come true.
Narration: Hitomi Kuroki, Music: Ryuichi Sakamoto, Co-making: the Japan Foundation.

For more information, please visit http://lightupnippon.jp/en/.

Action for Japan UK (http://actionforjapan-uk.net/)

Action for Japan UK is an organisation comprised of undergraduate and postgraduate students in the UK who want to help people affected by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan.

International Symposium: Climate Change and Energy Policy in a Post-Fukushima World – What does the future hold?

Date: 23 May 2012
Registration and Networking: 4.00-4.30pm
Symposium: 4.30-6.30pm
Location: DLA Piper LLP, 1 St. Paul’s Place, Sheffield S1 2JX
Attendance by ticket only. Please see below.

The March 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant exposes enduring questions about the safety and reliability of nuclear energy, the capabilities of human beings to predict and manage complex events, and the relationship between humanity and nature. The international response to the disaster has been varied; the UK position on nuclear power remains virtually unchanged, while Germany has vowed to phase out nuclear generation altogether by 2022. Japanese official policy is unlikely to phase out nuclear power entirely, but a de facto phase out appears possible.

Nuclear energy has been regarded as a failsafe method of reducing human dependence on fossil fuels and mitigating the worst impacts of climate change. What does the future hold for nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, and what impacts will there be on plans to reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change?

Demand for places is likely to exceed supply, so attendance at this event is by ticket only.Applications for attendance must be made through the following online booking form:
https://www.eventelephant.com/postfukushima/summary.htm. Non-attendance will be charged at £15 per ticket. Event queries: events@actionforinvolvement.org.uk, Tel: 07946 453 258.

Speakers:

Dr Wakako Hironaka

Dr Wakako Hironaka is a former Member of the House of Councillors (1986-2010) and a former Vice-Chair of the Democratic Party of Japan. Among her many roles, she has served as State Minister, Director-General of the Environment Agency (1993-94), Chair of the Committee on Fundamental National Policies, and Chair of the EU-Japan Parliamentary Group. Dr Hironaka has also been active internationally, as a Vice-Chair of Global Environmental Action, Chair of GLOBE Japan, and member of the World Commission on Forests and Sustainable Development, the Earth Charter Initiative, and International Science Advisory Board of UNESCO. She currently serves as Director-General of GEA, and as a Board Member of the Energy and Resources Institute, Earth Charter Commission and PA International Foundation. She was awarded the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun by the Emperor Akihito in 2010.

Councillor Jillian Creasy

Councillor Jillian Creasy was elected as Sheffield’s first Green Party City Councillor in 2004 and now leads the Green Group on the council. She still works part time as a medical doctor (General Practitioner). She makes the links between social and environmental sustainability philosophically, politically and personally.

Jun Arima

Jun Arima is Director General of the Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO) in London, seconded by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). From 1992 he had served in the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy (ANRE). In 1996, he was sent to the OECD as Councilor (energy advisor), to the Permanent Delegation of Japan. He served in senior positions in ANRE following his return to Japan. In 2002 he was sent to Paris and spent four years there as Head of the Country Studies Division for the International Energy Agency (IEA). His activities in international climate and energy issues have seen Arima recognised internationally, most recently as Japan’s chief negotiator at the UN Climate Talks in Cancun, Mexico in 2010.

Professor Neil Hyatt

Professor Neil Hyatt holds the Royal Academy of Engineering Research Chair in Radioactive Waste Management at the University of Sheffield. His current research programme involves: design and process engineering for the immobilisation of radioactive wastes, the behaviour of wasteform materials in conceptual disposal environments, and remediation of contaminated land. He is the author or co-author of more than 100 peer reviewed articles.

Shinichi Kihara

Shinichi Kihara has been Senior Energy Analyst at the International Energy Agency in Paris since 2009. He contributed to the in-depth analysis of nuclear power in the World Energy Outlook 2011. He previously served in the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), carrying out energy related work in the International Affairs Division of the Agency for Natural Resources in 2004 and Nuclear Power Safety Administration Division in 1998. He has diverse experience serving in other offices in the METI in the area of economic cooperation, trade, export control and others.

Teresa Hitchcock

Teresa Hitchcock is Senior Partner and UK head of Safety Health and Environment (SHE) within the Regulatory and Government Affairs group of international law firm DLA Piper. Before qualifying as a solicitor, she worked as a senior environmental and health and safety regulator in local government. Based in DLA Piper’s Sheffield office, Teresa subsequently built up the practice of what is now the national SHE team. Key areas of her recent practice have included regeneration projects, climate change law, the impact of Conservation Law on industrial operations, and a number of major health and safety investigations. For many years she has been a leading figure in the South Yorkshire Green Business Club and Teresa was recently appointed a Board Member for Sheffield First for Environment.

Event Chairman: Peter Matanle, School of East Asian Studies, University of Sheffield

Typhoon in Tokyo

 

Lessons from Japan’s Disaster

22 March 2012, 6:00 – 7:00pm

Chatham House, 10 St James’s Square, London SW1Y 4LE

The Great East Japan Earthquake on 11 March 2011 inflicted unprecedented damage on Japan. The social and economic turmoil continues to this day. The disaster exceeded all assumptions that the nation had made to date, unleashing catastrophic damage of unimaginable magnitude. The release of radioactive substances into the environment from the troubled Fukushima nuclear power plant has spread fear about the contamination of agricultural products and about other ramifications. Power shortages caused by reduced electricity generating capacity have extended economic disruption far beyond the areas immediately affected to the country as a whole. Japan’s experience is under scrutiny around the world from the perspective of crisis management. Meanwhile, in the wake of the disaster, people from all over the world extended warm support and encouragement to Japan. This resulted in Japan becoming the world’s largest recipient of aid for the year 2011. (Lessons from the Disaster: Risk management and the compound crisis presented by the Great East Japan Earthquake, edited by Yoichi Funabashi and Heizo Takenaka, The Japan Times, 2011)

The editors of the book believe that they can best repay the world for its interest and concern by reporting on the lessons Japan has learned from the disaster. In the seminar, Professor Takenaka will argue that the current crisis is a “comprehensively linked crisis” and will examine the impact the disaster inflicted on the Japanese economy as a whole, while Dr Funabashi will discuss the “failure” of the governance, calling the nuclear emergency at Fukushima a “man-made crisis”.

Dr Yoichi Funabashi

Dr Yoichi Funabashi is the former Editor-in-Chief and Columnist for the Asahi Shimbun. While at theAsahi Shimbun, Dr Funabashi was selected a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University and was appointed Visiting Fellow at the Institute for International Economics and Distinguished Guest Fellow at The Brookings Institution. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the International Crisis Group and currently serves as Director of the Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation. Funabashi graduated from the University of Tokyo and acquired his PhD from Keio University, where he is currently Guest Professor.

Professor Heizo Takenaka

Professor Heizo Takenaka is a graduate of Hitotsubashi University, where he earned a BA in Economics. After graduation, he joined the Japan Development Bank and later worked as Senior Economist in the Japanese Ministry of Finance. He was also a Visiting Associate Professor at Harvard University. During the period 2001–2006, Takenaka served in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Koizumi as Minister of State for Economic and Fiscal Policy, Minister of State for Financial Services, Minister of State for Privatization of the Postal Services, and Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications. Takenaka has a PhD in Economics from Osaka University, and is a professor in the Faculty of Policy Management at Keio University.

In Memory of Tsunami Victims

 

In memory of tsunami victims this Blog observes two day silence.

Fukushima’s animals abandoned and left to die

 

I found very hard to watch the video published on CNN website on Fukushima’s abandoned animals but while watching this sad video I was thinking about all the people who lost their lives, relatives and/or friends and never be able to forget the day Tsunami struck. When I think what human beings had to go through, then the condition of those animals, even if tragic, seems to be less important and I agree Japanese government that it would be far to risky and costly to try to save those animals.

Keeping Japan on the Map

Keeping Japan on the Map

A one-day conference in celebration of the Sasakawa Lectureship Programme and the breadth of Japanese Studies in the UK today

Friday 18th November 2011 9.00 – 17.00

Birkbeck College, University of London Room B04 43 Gordon Square, London WC1H

The tragic events of 11 March 2011 brought Japan abruptly into international focus as the impact of the earthquake, the tsunami and the nuclear problems were played out live on TV screens. Since then, so much of the world has returned to its ordinary business and Japan appears once more to have slipped off the world map.

But what happened in Japan earlier this year and how it has been reported by the media further demonstrated that there is still much that we can learn from Japan and Japan can learn from others. Indeed, the coverage of the disaster itself, as well as programmes and articles relating to Japan that subsequently appeared on UK TV and in the media, have revealed a deep-rooted interest in Japan today.

There are a number of UK universities that have staff conducting significant research on a range of Japan-related subjects. This conference is a celebration of that work. It also provides an opportunity to show-case some of the research being conducted by a number of the Sasakawa Lecturers who were appointed following a programme of staff expansion in Japanese studies funded by a grant from the Nippon Foundation to the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation in 2008.

For further information and booking click here

Flooding in Thailand

10 November 2011

The flooding situation in Thailand is mainly affecting the central provinces along the Chao Phraya River including Bangkok. Flood waters are subsiding in Ayutthaya. Other popular tourist destinations in the central region including Pattaya, Hua Hin, Kanchanaburi and Ko Chang have not been affected by the floods. Tourist destinations in the south of Thailand including Phuket, Krabi, Surat Thani, Ko Samui, Hat Yai and Phang-Nga; and in the north including Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and Sukhothai, also have not been affected by the floods.

Flood waters in Ayutthaya and some other central provinces have begun to subside, although many areas are not yet fully accessible. Tourist attractions in Ayutthaya will reopen once they have been restored.

In some areas, tourists may find that there are occasional shortages of consumer products that are in high demand such as local brands of water and locally-bottled beer. These products are replenished periodically. Imported products including beer and bottled water are widely available.

The Transport Ministry is preparing alternate routes between Bangkok and the southern provinces in case some parts of Highway 35, a major road to the south also known as Rama II Road, is affected by the flood waters draining to the west of the city.

Situation in Bangkok
Areas flooded in the Bangkok Metropolitan Area include suburbs in the east and west, the west bank of the Chao Phraya River, and districts in the northern part of the city.

In central Bangkok, businesses, hotels, shops and tourist attractions remain open as per normal in areas including:

	Khao San Road			Ratchaprasong (Central World area)
	Phetchaburi Road			Sathorn
	Ploenchit/ Chidlom			Siam Square/ MBK/ Siam Paragon
	Pratunam			Silom/ Surawongse
	Rama 1 Road			Sukhumvit Road/ The Emporium
	Rama 4 Road			Yaowarat (Chinatown)

Given the rapidly changing nature of the flooding situation in Bangkok, visitors should check multiple sources of information to make an informed decision about whether they should visit central Bangkok at the present time.

The BTS Skytrain and MRT subway are operating normally at this time. Some MRT stations have closed certain entrances as a precaution. Visitors are advised to check with the BTS and MRT regarding the current status of their operations. Taxis and tuk tuks are available although the number in service is reduced. Many BMTA bus routes have been rerouted or suspended due to the flooding. Express boat services on the Chao Phraya River have also been suspended, as have most water-related tourist activities.

Transportation

Airports:
Bangkok is served by two airports. Suvarnabhumi Airport, the main international gateway to Thailand, remains open. It has considerable flood protection measures in place. Suvarnabhumi Airport is the main connector for international arrivals to domestic flights serving tourist destinations throughout Thailand such as Phuket, Chiang Mai and Surat Thani. Domestic flights are operating as per normal between Suvarnabhumi Airport and other airports in Thailand.

Transportation to and from the airport into central Bangkok including taxis, buses and the Airport Rail Link have not been affected by the floods and are operating normally. Highways from the airport to tourist destinations southeast of Bangkok such as Pattaya, Rayong and Ko Chang are open.

Don Mueang Airport, the old international airport, is closed due to flooding. The two domestic airlines operating from Don Mueang have temporarily switched their operations to Suvarnabhumi Airport.

A “Tourist Assistance Center” is set up on the 3rd floor of Airport Rail Link’s Makkasan Station to facilitate tourists’ transport from hotels in central Bangkok to the airport. The TAT and the Thai Hotels Association (THA) are providing free transportation from hotels to Makkasan Station. The Tourist Police will assist tourists at Makkasan Station and at the airport. Tourists who would like to use this service can contact the Tourist Assistance Center via the TAT Call Center at 1672, or the Tourist Police at 1155.

State Railway of Thailand and inter-provincial bus services:
State Railway of Thailand (SRT) and inter-provincial bus services are operating as per usual in areas that are not affected by the floods. In Bangkok and other areas affected by the floods, the SRT and inter-provincial bus service operators are adjusting their routes to best serve passengers given the disruptions caused by the flooding. Inter-provincial buses from Bangkok to southern provinces are leaving from a temporary station with shuttle services to and from the Southern Bus Terminal, also known as Sai Tai Mai.

Train services to northeastern Thailand are operating as per normal. Train services to the northern provinces are operating between Hua Lamphong station in central Bangkok and Chiang Mai. Trains to the north are being rerouted around flooded areas, adding approximately two hours of travel time. Train services to the southern provinces are operating mainly from Nakhon Pathom due to flooding in Bangkok’s western suburbs. The SRT is providing shuttle bus services between Hua Lamphong station and Nakhon Pathom. Travelers are advised to check in advance with these operators and may want to consider flying to their destinations within Thailand.

Dealing with Disaster in Japan: Flight JL123 Crash

Book launch

Published by Routledge, 2011

By Christopher P. Hood

Just as the sinking of the Titanic is embedded in the public consciousness in the English-speaking world, so the crash of JAL flight JL123 is part of the Japanese collective memory. The 1985 crash involved the largest loss of life for any single air crash in the world. 520 people, many of whom had been returning to their ancestral home for the Obon religious festival, were killed; there were only four survivors.

This book tells the story of the crash, discusses the many controversial issues surrounding it, and considers why it has come to have such importance for many Japanese. It shows how the Japanese responded to the disaster: trying to comprehend how a faulty repair may have caused the crash, and the fact that rescue services took such a long time to reach the remote crash site; how the bereaved dealt with their loss; how the media in Japan and in the wider world reported the disaster; and how the disaster is remembered and commemorated. The book highlights the media coverage of anniversary events and the Japanese books and films about the crash; the very particular memorialisation process in Japan, alongside Japanese attitudes to death and religion; it points out in what ways this crash both reflects typical Japanese behaviour and in what ways the crash is unique.

* The book will be available on the day at 30% off the retail price.   

 

Dr. Christopher P. Hood is a Reader in Japanese Studies at Cardiff University, UK. His publications include:Shinkansen: From Bullet Train to Symbol of Modern Japan, Japanese Education Reform: Nakasone’s Legacyand (as editor) the four-volume Politics of Modern Japan (all published by Routledge).

Nihon Kizuna

Worldwide artists contribute to Nihon Kizuna music compilation in aid of Japan disaster relief effort

Over 40 international artists have donated music for the Nihon Kizuna compilation in aid of the Japan disaster relief effort. Nihon Kizuna, or 日本絆 in Japanese roughly translates as ‘bond of friendship with Japan’.

Following the earthquake and tsunami which devastated the northern coast and prefectures of Japan on Friday March 11th 2011, a small group of Tokyo-based artists (from Japan, Ukraine and France) and one visiting London-based journalist (from Italy) decided to pull their efforts and contacts together to do the only thing they could to help the country and its people – sell music to raise awareness of the devastation that hit the area and raise money for its people and the relief effort.

www.nihonkizuna.com

History Repeats by Kenzaburo Oe

I decided to post an interesting and provoking article written by Kenzaburo Oe and published by The New Yorker on the recent events. Let me know your opinion.

By chance, the day before the earthquake, I wrote an article, which was published a few days later, in the morning edition of the Asahi Shimbun. The article was about a fisherman of my generation who had been exposed to radiation in 1954, during the hydrogen-bomb testing at Bikini Atoll. I first heard about him when I was nineteen. Later, he devoted his life to denouncing the myth of nuclear deterrence and the arrogance of those who advocated it. Was it a kind of sombre foreboding that led me to evoke that fisherman on the eve of the catastrophe? He has also fought against nuclear power plants and the risk that they pose. I have long contemplated the idea of looking at recent Japanese history through the prism of three groups of people: those who died in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, those who were exposed to the Bikini tests, and the victims of accidents at nuclear facilities. If you consider Japanese history through these stories, the tragedy is self-evident. Today, we can confirm that the risk of nuclear reactors has become a reality. However this unfolding disaster ends—and with all the respect I feel for the human effort deployed to contain it—its significance is not the least bit ambiguous: Japanese history has entered a new phase, and once again we must look at things through the eyes of the victims of nuclear power, of the men and the women who have proved their courage through suffering. The lesson that we learn from the current disaster will depend on whether those who survive it resolve not to repeat their mistakes.

This disaster unites, in a dramatic way, two phenomena: Japan’s vulnerability to earthquakes and the risk presented by nuclear energy. The first is a reality that this country has had to face since the dawn of time. The second, which may turn out to be even more catastrophic than the earthquake and the tsunami, is the work of man. What did Japan learn from the tragedy of Hiroshima? One of the great figures of contemporary Japanese thought, Shuichi Kato, who died in 2008, speaking of atomic bombs and nuclear reactors, recalled a line from “The Pillow Book,” written a thousand years ago by a woman, Sei Shonagon, in which the author evokes “something that seems very far away but is, in fact, very close.” Nuclear disaster seems a distant hypothesis, improbable; the prospect of it is, however, always with us. The Japanese should not be thinking of nuclear energy in terms of industrial productivity; they should not draw from the tragedy of Hiroshima a “recipe” for growth. Like earthquakes, tsunamis, and other natural calamities, the experience of Hiroshima should be etched into human memory: it was even more dramatic a catastrophe than those natural disasters precisely because it was man-made. To repeat the error by exhibiting, through the construction of nuclear reactors, the same disrespect for human life is the worst possible betrayal of the memory of Hiroshima’s victims.

I was ten years old when Japan was defeated. The following year, the new Constitution was proclaimed. For years afterward, I kept asking myself whether the pacifism written into our Constitution, which included the renunciation of the use of force, and, later, the Three Non-Nuclear Principles (don’t possess, manufacture, or introduce into Japanese territory nuclear weapons) were an accurate representation of the fundamental ideals of postwar Japan. As it happens, Japan has progressively reconstituted its military force, and secret accords made in the nineteen-sixties allowed the United States to introduce nuclear weapons into the archipelago, thereby rendering those three official principles meaningless. The ideals of postwar humanity, however, have not been entirely forgotten. The dead, watching over us, oblige us to respect those ideals, and their memory prevents us from minimizing the pernicious nature of nuclear weaponry in the name of political realism. We are opposed. Therein lies the ambiguity of contemporary Japan: it is a pacifist nation sheltering under the American nuclear umbrella. One hopes that the accident at the Fukushima facility will allow the Japanese to reconnect with the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to recognize the danger of nuclear power, and to put an end to the illusion of the efficacy of deterrence that is advocated by nuclear powers.

When I was at an age that is commonly considered mature, I wrote a novel called “Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness.” Now, in the final stage of life, I am writing a “last novel.” If I manage to outgrow this current madness, the book that I write will open with the last line of Dante’s Inferno: “And then we came out to see once more the stars.”