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RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 1913
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 10 TOKYO 005243
SIPDIS
SIPDIS
DEPT FOR E, P, EB, EAP/J, EAP/P, EAP/PD, PA
WHITE HOUSE/NSC/NEC; JUSTICE FOR STU CHEMTOB IN ANTI-TRUST DIVISION;
TREASURY/OASIA/IMI/JAPAN; DEPT PASS USTR/PUBLIC AFFAIRS OFFICE;
SECDEF FOR JCS-J-5/JAPAN,
DASD/ISA/EAPR/JAPAN; DEPT PASS ELECTRONICALLY TO USDA
FAS/ITP FOR SCHROETER; PACOM HONOLULU FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY ADVISOR;
CINCPAC FLT/PA/ COMNAVFORJAPAN/PA.
E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: OIIP KMDR KPAO PGOV PINR ECON ELAB JA
SUBJECT: DAILY SUMMARY OF JAPANESE PRESS 09/12/06
INDEX:
(1) Election campaign pamphlet provided by the Shinzo Abe Support
Team
(2) Election campaign pamphlet issued by the Taro Aso campaign
headquarters
(3) Editorial: Revision of Antimonopoly Law - Easing severe
punishment problematic
(4) Gov't to remove Libya from embargo list
(5) Editorial: 5 years after 9-11- A day to renew antiterror
resolve
(6) US society still shaken five years after 9/11 attacks: Constant
crackdowns put Muslims in great fear; Long detention without
evidence under criticism from ex-FBI officer
ARTICLES:
(1) Election campaign pamphlet provided by the Shinzo Abe Support
Team
Toward a Beautiful Country: Shinzo Abe's policy platform
Basic direction of Abe administration
Build a country that will cherish culture, traditions, nature, and
history
-- Establish a Constitution befitting Japan that will open a new
age.
-- Bring about an open conservatism.
-- Cherish our historical heritage, landscape, and traditional
culture.
-- Restore family values and regional warmth.
A country of freedom and discipline
-- Basically reform the education system.
-- Achieve private sector independence by breaking away from the
tendency to excessively rely on public aid.
-- Give peace of mind and safety to the people.
A country walking down road of new growth and prosperity with
innovation
-- No future without growth.
-- Achieve economic growth through innovation.
-- Demonstrate the ability to set high standards and the country's
presence in the international community.
An open country with leadership that is trusted, respected, and
loved by the world
-- Play up attractiveness of Japan to the world.
-- Make contributions actively by cashing in on Japan's strong
points.
-- Foster people who can make great achievements and make
contributions in the international community.
Concrete policies
1. Establishing political leadership
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1) For speedy and accurate decision making that can meet changing
times, implement the following reforms to strengthen the political
leadership and establish a top-down system led by the Prime
Minister's Official Residence (Kantei):
-- The cabinet and the ruling coalition must combine their wisdoms
and insights to establish a Kantei-led political leadership with
elected politicians redefining their role as lawmakers responsible
for decision-making and the role of bureaucrats.
-- Strengthen the teamwork among ministers, senior vice ministers,
and parliamentary secretaries.
2) Fundamentally reform or realign administrative organs to fit the
21st century.
3) Reduce the number of civil servants, introduce a merit system, or
other means to reform the civil servant system, and combine wisdoms
of the private and public sectors for policymaking.
2. Realizing an open economic society with freedom and discipline
1) Establish a new partnership between the public and private
sectors.
-- Pursue a small and efficient government. Fully utilize the
private sector.
-- Back up public entities, such as new nonprofit organizations.
2) Invigorate Japanese society with innovation and open society
-- Maintain the vigor of Japanese society with innovation despite
the declining birthrate.
-- Improve infrastructure to gather together good people, products,
and money from around the world.
-- Come up with an economic strategy to take in Asia's growth.
-- Improve the productivity of a broad range of industries base on
innovation.
-- Strongly support the research and development of cutting-edge
industries.
-- Adopt a plan to strategically use the Internet infrastructure
that would be the most advanced in the world.
-- Powerfully assist medium and small companies with taxes and
financing.
-- Transform agricultural, forestry, fisheries, construction, and
other industries into strategic industries.
-- Enhance responsible corporate management and governance.
-- Beef up the Japanese financial market comparable to London and
New York.
-- Actively address global warming.
3) Create a society where anyone can get a second chance
-- Build a society where efforts are rewarded with no fixed line
between the winning and losing sides.
-- Transform Japan into a country with diversified work, learning,
and lifestyles filled with opportunities.
-- Actively promote the employment of women and elderly people.
-- Actively review ways to work that transcend conventional work
values, such as tele-work.
4) Local vigor essential for state vitality
-- Promote decentralization and efforts to streamline the
administration in the process of mapping out a doshu (regional bloc)
system vision to create strong local areas under the lead of the
private sector.
-- Come up with a plan to enhance the strong points of local
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regions.
-- Promote local reforms further.
-- Map out a comprehensive plan to capitalize on the beautiful
land.
-- Establish a national system to ensure a peaceful public
livelihood.
5) No growth, no fiscal reconstruction
-- Restore fiscal health so as not to pass the buck to future
generations.
-- In overhauling the nation's revenues and expenditures as a
package, address national spending reform on a priority basis based
on economic growth.
-- Reform the tax system, such as the consumption tax rate and ways
to redistribute the direct taxes, from a long-term prospective.
3.Realizing a healthy and safe society
1) Create safety nets by using a Japanese social security model.
-- Comprehensively review the pension, medical, nursing care, and
social welfare systems to come up with sustainable systems and a
simple picture depicting a future livelihood.
- Study introducing a social welfare number system and a unified
premium collection system.
- Establish a friendly and easy-to-understand pension system by, for
instance, notifying projected pension benefits ahead of schedule.
- Thoroughly reform the Social Security Agency.
- Improve elective safety nets by upgrading the defined contribution
pension plan and other means.
- Integrate the employee pension schemes into one.
-- Expand healthy life expectancy by using innovation that combines
the medical frontier strategy and advanced technology.
-- Promote measures to address a lack of pediatricians and
obstetricians and gynecologists.
-- Establish a society where the handicapped can become truly
independent and take part in society.
-- Establish a sustainable nursing care system.
-- Build a society friendly to childrearing.
2) A 100-year educational reform plan
-- Provide everyone with opportunities to acquire a high scholastic
ability and standards.
- Enhance basic programs, such as mathematics, science, and
languages
- Improve and strengthen the public education system.
-- Strengthen the education system at high school, special course
school, and advanced technical school, to meet social needs.
-- Increase the international competitiveness of colleges,
universities, and graduate schools, and promote international
cooperation.
-- Realign and strengthen research and development institutions.
-- Introduce a school and teacher evaluation system.
-- Improve social experience-oriented school activities.
4. Creating a strong and dependable Japan through an assertive
diplomacy
1) Strengthen the Japan-US alliance for the sake of Asia and the
world. Establish alliance arrangements in which both countries will
"expend sweat." Strengthen bilateral alliance ties on the economic
front, as well.
2) Establish firm cooperative relations in an open Asia.
-- Enhance relations of trust with neighboring countries, including
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China and South Korea.
3) Aim for a settlement of the abduction, nuclear, and missiles
issues involving North Korea.
4) Spread throughout the world a widening circle of free societies.
-- Promote a strategic dialogue with countries sharing the same
values, such as the United States, European nations, Australia, and
India.
5) Serve as a driving force for global economic consolidation
-- Promote the WTO system and the concept of an Asia-Pacific
community by capitalizing on FTAs and EPAs.
6) Establish energy security
-- Actively contribute to the world in the fields of energy saving
and global environmental and secure stable energy resources.
7) Become a country that can play a responsible role in the world
-- Actively join peace-building efforts, such as humanitarian
assistance and nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and
developing human resources.
-- Pursue goals in Japanese diplomacy, such as strategically using
ODA, protecting the environment, engaging in human rights diplomacy,
and accepting more foreign students.
8) Reorganize and strengthen the Kantei's diplomatic and security
functions to make it act as a control tower
-- Increase the function of intelligence gathering.
5. Party reform: Visions as a responsible political party of a new
age
1) Thoroughly utilize the public recruitment and primary systems in
determining candidates.
2) Realign and strengthen party organizations across the country.
3) Come up with strategic measures for new industries, networks, and
needs.
4) Use think tanks to map out independent policies.
6. Depart from the postwar regime
1) Start work on drafting a new Constitution befitting Japan's state
image of the 21st century.
2) Aim for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council from a
perspective of strengthening Japan's capability to setting
international standards.
(2) Election campaign pamphlet issued by the Taro Aso campaign
headquarters
Taro Aso: Japan's potential power - challenges of vitality and
security
My ideal Japan
1. Vibrant aged society
-- Make an aging society bright and vibrant.
-- Build a Japan in which people of all ages and both sexes can
vigorously participate in society and have the drive to work.
2. Society in which people can actually feel affluence
-- Emerge from being an economic power where people cannot feel the
affluence in their own lives
-- Shift priority from quantity to quality and create a nation in
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which the people will love to live
3. Secure society
-- Erase various destabilizing factors and create a society where
people will feel at ease
-- Revitalize communities by strengthening safety nets and social
security
Basic policies
1. Economic policy - steady economic growth
-- Aim to attain sustainable, stable economic growth
-- Assume growth policy that will make use of Japan's full potential
by such measures as tax incentives
-- Increase tax rates after the goals of economic recovery and
spending cuts are achieved
2. Educational reform - reinforcement of basic education
-- Start compulsory education from infancy and Introduce a
satisfactory educational system focusing on discipline, as well as
basic reading and writing skills
-- Introduce a system that places emphasis on the classroom
-- Reduce the parental burden and enable parents to choose the
schools they want their children to attend
3. Foreign policy - proud and vital diplomacy
-- Seek stability of Asia, with the Japan-US alliance as the
cornerstone
-- Take a rational stance toward neighboring countries while
pursuing common interests with them
Taking a challenger's stance
1. Becoming a country that is a forerunner in challenging the world
-- Affluence is impossible without challenges
-- Make Japan a forerunner in the world
-- Build a vigorous society by making use of the capabilities of
senior citizens
2. Industries that challenge
-- Support industries by utilizing technical renovation and
promoting deregulation
3. Support of local communities' vitality
-- Revive local communities in order to revive Japan
-- Support the future vision of each local community
-- Transfer fiscal resources from the central government to local
governments to that end
Political reform
1. Simple, warm government
-- Aim to establish a simple, warm government that can properly meet
public expectations
2. Decentralization
-- Promote decentralization while reflecting the opinions of local
groups
-- Aim to introduce a regional bloc system
3. Diet reform
-- Make debates more substantial and increase efficiency in
deliberations
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4. LDP reform
-- Unify the functions of the cabinet and the party
-- Strengthen cooperation with local organizations
5. Powerful political leadership
-- Implement policies under cooperative political leadership
-- Listen to public views and gather the wisdom of many
(3) Editorial: Revision of Antimonopoly Law - Easing severe
punishment problematic
TOKYO SHIMBUN (Page 5) (Full)
September 12, 2006
Efforts to revise the amended Antimonopoly Law (AML), which was put
into effect only this January, are now being made. The bone of
contention is a system in which the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) acts
as both prosecutor and judge regarding surcharges and criminal
punishments of companies that have violated the law. It is all right
to discuss the possibility of revising the law, but it is
problematic if it means easing punishment.
That is because regarding a revision of the amended AML, the
supplementary provision categorically mentions that consideration
should be given to the proper form of the surcharge system and
appeal procedures within two years after enforcement and that
necessary measures should then be taken.
The Council to Discuss Basic Issues on the AML, a private panel
consisting of experts that reports to the chief cabinet secretary,
is now discussing the issue. The panel in July released the points
at issue, including its viewpoint on the envisaged revision and the
nature of a system designed to constitute a deterrent to AML
violations.
However, the chief objective of the points at issue is to introduce
the views of panel members, and as such, they do not indicate any
direction for a revision of the amended AML.
For instance, concerning the application of surcharges and criminal
penalties for cartel activities, the points at issue argued that
this is rare internationally and should thus be eliminated, while it
claimed that the dual roles played by the FTC regarding egregious
behavior function well.
Nippon Keidanren (Japan Business Federation) is apparently unhappy
with the points at issue carrying both arguments. It immediately
offered a rebuttal titled, "The Right Direction for a Drastic
Revision." It first called for the abolition of the system in which
the Fair Trade Commission serves as judge and for the elimination of
the combination of surcharges and criminal punishments.
Its call for scrapping the system is based on the view that under
such a system the FTC serves as both prosecutor and judge, making it
difficult to ensure a fair decision. Keidanren has proposed that
those who disagree with an administrative punishment should be able
to file a lawsuit instead of filing a complaint with the FTC.
The arguments offered by Keidanren indeed point out problems with
the amended law. Its arguments also include doubts and
dissatisfaction harbored by companies or industrial organizations,
such as the need to clarify the legal nature of surcharges and
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guarantee the legitimate right of defense against screening by the
FTC.
However, this type of counterargument is tantamount to calling for
easing the principle of punishment under the amended AML. Can such
an argument obtain understanding from the public?
To begin with, the AML, which has been called the economic
constitution, aims to ensure fair and free competition. However,
there has been no end to violations of the AML since its enactment
of the lain 1947 to date. That was why the major amendment,
including a substantial hike in surcharges, was made. The top
priority for business circles should be to reduce violations.
The FTC is expected to shortly release a formal view on the issue.
It basically intends to maintain both the judge system to review
cases and the application of surcharges and criminal punishments as
stipulated under the amended AML. At the same time, the FTA perhaps
should make efforts to foster national understanding toward the
amended law.
(4) Gov't to remove Libya from embargo list
MAINICHI (Page 2) (Abridged)
September 12, 2006
The government decided yesterday to exclude Libya from its embargo
list of four countries, including North Korea, for especially strict
export restrictions on products that can be diverted for weapons
use. Libya decided in 2003 to scrap its weapons of mass destruction
programs, and the United States removed Libya from its terror list
in May this year. In response, the government made the decision. The
government will make a cabinet decision in late October on removing
Libya from the embargo list. The United States will ease its
pressure on these countries if they change their adversarial
attitudes. The government is responding to this US strategy and is
also urging North Korea to make a policy changeover.
The government restricts military convertible products under a
cabinet order based on the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade
Control Law. There are about 80 restricted products, including
pumps, optical fiber cables, and integrated circuits. The government
is currently imposing double-decker restrictions on exporters. In
concrete terms, the government requires the economy, trade and
industry minister's permission to ship a product priced at one
million yen or higher. In addition, the government also requires
exporters to ask for the minister's permission to export a product
worth 50,000 yen or more to four specific countries, including North
Korea.
This time, the government will remove Libya from its list of
countries for the second requirement and will move that country to
the list of countries for the first requirement. In addition, the
government will require permission for shipments to three countries,
including North Korea, instead of retaining the current ceilings or
upper limits of exports to these countries.
(5) Editorial: 5 years after 9-11- A day to renew antiterror
resolve
SANKEI (Page 3) (Full)
September 10, 2006
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Again, that day has come around. Five years ago on Sept. 11,
terrorists attacked America at its nerve centers.
Al Qaeda-a worldwide terrorist group consisting of Islamic
radicals-hijacked two US airliners and crashed them into the World
Trade Center's twin towers in New York City. Hours later, the two
skyscrapers crumbled. The shocking scenes are deeply engraved in the
hearts and minds of people throughout the world. The trauma has yet
to be overcome.
Shortly thereafter, President Bush declared retaliation against the
terrorist group. The next month, US and British forces launched an
air campaign in Afghanistan, where Al Qaeda's leader, Osama bin
Laden, was believed to be hiding. The US-led international forces
overthrew the Taliban regime of that country. In March 2003, the
United States launched attacks in Iraq, which was regarded as a
hotbed of terrorism. One month later, the multinational forces
toppled the Hussein regime.
The threat of terror, however, is still alive. We recall two other
terrorist attacks: the Madrid, Spain, train bombings of March 2004,
and the London subway and bus bombings of July 2005. Last month,
Britain unearthed a massive plot to blow up jetliners in flight from
London to the United States. In Iraq as well, the security situation
remains unstable with religious conflicts involving Islamic
radicals.
The US president called the war on terror over the past five years
"the first war of the 21st century," emphasizing it as an
"ideological struggle" to defend freedom and democracy. The problem,
however, is that Al Qaeda and other terrorist elements are invisible
enemies. One expert notes that there are 30-40 Islamic jihadist
groups with 50,000-200,000 members in the world, all having
something to do with Al Qaeda.
The question is what should we do to contain terrorism. Needless to
say, the international community should carry out antiterror
cooperation that transcends the specific interests of its members.
Each of its members has to take a resolute stand against terrorism.
In addition, each country needs to collect accurate intelligence
while protecting human rights and practicing fair justice.
There is no guarantee that Japan will not come under terrorist
attack. In his bid to take the premiership, Chief Cabinet Secretary
Shinzo Abe has come up with a plan to set up an
intelligence-gathering body that would go beyond the
interdepartmental barriers of government ministries and agencies.
However, it is a categorical imperative to consolidate adequate and
effective functions.
The war on terror will not end easily. Sept. 11 is the day for the
whole world to renew its antiterror resolve.
(6) US society still shaken five years after 9/11 attacks: Constant
crackdowns put Muslims in great fear; Long detention without
evidence under criticism from ex-FBI officer
MAINICHI (Page 7) (Full)
September 5, 2006
Sumire Kunieda
The 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States in 2001 that killed
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some 3,000 people still remain fresh in the minds of the American
people. It has been five years since then. The fear of terrorism
still weights heavy on the minds of Americans. The hearts of the
families of the victims have been changed forever. We follow these
themes below.
By the US government's request, a Korean Air passenger jet bound for
San Francisco made an emergency landing at Narita Airport on May 30,
2005. The reason was that a man on the US blacklist of passengers
was aboard the plane. After the aircraft landed, a US Federal Bureau
of Investigation (FBI) agent questioned him at Narita Airport. He
was then sent back to the United States, where he was arrested as a
terrorist suspect.
The man is Hamid Hayat, 23, a plant worker living in Lodi,
California. He was convicted this past April of terrorism charges as
specified under the Patriotism Act, for it was learned that he had
taken part in terrorist training at a camp in Pakistan. He is likely
to be sentenced in November to 39 years in prison.
The material evidence the FBI provided to the court was a videotape
of his interrogation at the time of his arrest, a videotaped
conversation between FBI informant Naseem Khan, 33, who had
infiltrated into a community of Pakistani immigrants in Lodi, and
four satellite-taken photos.
FBI Special Agent in Charge of the Sacramento Field Office Drew
Parenti, 46, told the Mainichi Shimbun: "Hamid told Khan that he
would attend the terrorist training camp and during interrogation,
he admitted that fact, and he even gave an account of what the camp
was like. We are confident we can prosecute him."
But defendant Hamid Hayat kept changing his testimony about the
location of the camp from Afghanistan to Kashimir (Pakistan) and
then to somewhere near his village. A lawyer said angrily: "That's
because of the result of his long detention without access to a
lawyer. Who can believe such preposterous testimony?"
Doubts also have been cast on the role played by the FBI informant,
since Khan was given $225,000 or about 26.3 million yen by the FBI
as a reward. The taped telephone conversation between Khan and Hamid
Hayat, when the latter was in Pakistan, showed Khan trying to get
Hayat to tell him something about the camp.
Khan: "What have you been doing recently?"
Hayat: "Nothing."
Khan: "Nothing? You should do something. Are you a man? You told me
you would attend a camp in Pakistan and would do this or that there.
But all you are doing now is sitting with your arms folded."
"I've never seen an investigation this terrible," lamented a former
FBI agent with 35 years experience at the Bureau. He judged that
except for the defendant's confession, there was no material
evidence. He resolved himself to help the defendant's legal team
because of a concern this case might have an adverse effect on the
war on terror. He said: "People who immigrated to the US might come
to think that even though they did not do anything wrong, they might
be arrested. They might become reluctant to cooperate with the FBI."
The guilty verdict handed down to defendant Hayat came as a shock to
the Pakistani community in America.
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A 58-year-old man said: "People have cast suspicious eyes at Muslims
since the 9/11 attacks every time something happened. This is the
same way the Japanese-Americans were treated when placed into camps
during World War II."
In 2000, only 14 cases were prosecuted on terrorist charges, but it
jumped to 440 covering the past five years since the 9/11 incident.
The FBI bragged about the results of its investigations, noting,
"261 prosecution cases filed by us won guilty verdicts." On the
other hand, strong-arm investigative methods have been criticized.
Of the so-called terrorist cases that federal investigative
agencies, including the FBI, have brought to the court by this past
May, 90 percent have been rejected for such reasons as insufficient
evidence. The US justice system is wavering in between prevention of
terrorism and protection of human rights.
SCHIEFFER