Itoman fishing port(Itoman City)
Itoman HA-RE executive committee
098-992-2011
06/07/2008

Ishigaki Island
Ishigaki triathlon executive committee
0980-82-1212
04/13/2008

Ginowan seaside park(Ginowan city)
Ryukyu-kaiensai executive committee
098-897-2764
04/12/2008

Uruma city yonashiro sports park(Uruma city)
Ayahashi kaichu road race festival executive committee
098-978-9404
04/06/2008

Tsuboya Pottery Museum,Tsuboya Area(Naha city)
Tsuboya Pottery Museum
098-862-3761
04/03/2008 - 04/06/2008

Basic Japanese conversation with English translations.

• Good morning -- Ohayo gozaimasu
• Good afternoon (day) -- Konnichiwa
• Good evening -- Konbanwa
• Good-bye -- Sayonara
• Good night -- Oyasuminasai
• How are you? -- O genki desu ka?
• How do you do? -- Hajimemashite
• Pleased to meet you -- Dozo yoroshiku or Yoroshiku onegaishimasu
• I am fine -- Hai, genki desu
• And you? -- Anata wa?
• Thank you (very much) -- Domo arigato gozaimasu
• You're welcome -- Do itashi mashite
• Say! Listen! (to get attention) -- Anone
• Excuse me (to get attention) -- Sumi masen
• Excuse me (pardon me) -- Gomen nasai or Shitsurei shimasu
• I am sorry -- Gomen nasai
• Please (when offering something) -- Dozo
• Please (when requesting something) -- Kudasai
• Please show me -- Misete kudasai
• Please write it -- Kaite kudasai
• Please give me this -- Kore o kudasai
• I'm sick -- Byoki desu
• Let's go -- Ikimasho
• Do you speak English? -- Anata wa eigo o hanashimasu ka?
• Yes, I speak a little -- Hai, sukoshi hanashimasu
• Do you understand? -- Wakarimasu ka?
• Yes, I understand -- Hai, wakarimasu
• Oh, I see -- As, soo desu ka
• No, I don't understand -- Iie, wakarimasen
• Please say it again -- Mo ichido itte kudasai
• Please speak slowly -- Yukkuri hanashi te kudasai
• Please wait a moment -- Chotto matte kudasai
• What is your name? -- Anata-no namae wa?
• My name is _______ -- Watashi no namae wa ________ desu
• Where is it? -- Doko desu ka?
• What time is it? -- Nan-ji desu ka?
• How much is it? -- Sore wa ikura desu ka?
• I will take it -- Sore kudasai
• No, thank you -- Iie kekko desu
• Do you like it? -- Suki desu ka?
• I like it -- Suki desu
• I don't like it -- Kirai desu
• It's beautiful -- Kirei desu
• Hello (on telephone only) -- Moshi moshi
• Let me see -- So desu ne
• Welcome -- Irrasshaimase
• Where is the toilet? -- Toire wa doko desu ka?

YOKOHAMA -- A 21-year-old man fell unconscious after he was thrown 8 meters off a highway to a road below by the driver of a car following a fight over a traffic accident, police said.

Kazuya Kudo, 21, from Yokohama's Kanazawa-ku, is in a serious condition after he struck his head hard on the road below at around 6:10 a.m. on Wednesday.

A car driven by Kudo was involved in an accident with another car driven by an unidentified man near the Horiguchi-Nokendai Interchange along the Yokohama-Yokosuka Road in Kanazawa-ku, local police said.

The two men got into a fight over the accident, and Kudo was thrown off the highway by the other man and fell onto a municipal road about eight meters below. Kudo's car was left on its side at the scene.

Police are searching for the man who attacked Kudo and fled in a blackish car. Investigators will press charges of inflicting bodily injury against the man, who reportedly appeared to be around 25 years old and was about 180 centimeters tall.

A woman who was riding in Kudo's car reported the incident, police said.

OSAKA -- A man who left an injured woman in a hospital parking lot after crashing his car into her bicycle was arrested Wednesday, police said.

The 33-year-old unemployed man, Takeshi Yamasaki, was arrested on suspicion of negligent driving resulting in injury, violating the Road Traffic Law, and abandoning his responsibility as a guardian. He has reportedly admitted having left the woman in a van in the parking lot.

"When I looked at the victim, she was heavily injured, and I thought that if I just left her she would die, so I took her to the hospital. Since I had done other bad things, I ran away," he was quoted as saying.

Yamasaki has already been charged with theft.

Investigators said Yamasaki hit the bicycle of a 39-year-old woman from Osaka's Hirano-ku with his van on a road in Higashiosaka at about 5:20 a.m. on Nov. 22 last year. After the accident, he took her in his van to the parking lot of a hospital about two kilometers away and left her there in the vehicle.

The woman still remains unconscious.

SAITAMA -- Five people who purposely caused traffic accidents to swindle an insurance company out of compensation benefits while taking absence from work have been arrested on suspicion of fraud, police said.

One of the five suspects has admitted to the allegations, but the other four, including a 26-year-old resident of Tsurugashima, Saitama Prefecture, have denied the allegations, investigators said.

Police said the five knew each other from their days as junior high school students. They suspect the group used the same tactics to rake in about 20 million yen.

Investigators said the group members split up into a car and a rented vehicle and deliberately crashed into each other on a road in Katashina, Gunma Prefecture, at about 10:40 a.m. on Jan. 8, 2005. They then allegedly swindled a total of about 4.08 million yen in medical fees and compensation benefits for being absent from work from an insurance company.

On the day of the "accident," they filed a report to police, citing damage to property, and then went into hospital saying they had whiplash, and filed for compensation for absence from work.

The group's alleged actions were uncovered after the insurance company contacted police, saying that there was a person who had received insurance payouts multiple times.

NAGANO -- A man found dead in a house fire here is believed to be its 95-year-old resident, investigators said.

A fire broke out at the home of Hajime Kitamura, 95, in the Kazama district of Nagano and burned down the two-story wooden structure, local police said.

The body of a man was subsequently pulled out of the debris. Investigators suspect that the body is that of Kitamura, who remains missing, and are trying to confirm his identity.

Kitamura was living at the home alone. A neighbor found his home enveloped in flames and alerted a local fire station.

A 73-year-old TV announcer will marry a woman 30 years younger than him, it was learned on Wednesday.

Fumio Yamamoto, a freelance announcer, will marry a 43-year-old woman whom he met during the shooting of a TV program. It is his second marriage.

Yamamoto used to be an announcer for Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) before he became a freelancer. He is known for hosting such programs as "Teleport TBS 6," "Morning Eye" and "Rakugo Tokusenkai."

TOKYO (AP) -- The booming popularity of Nintendo's Wii console and DS handheld sent the combined sales of game machines and gaming software in Japan to a record high last year, according to research by a Japanese publisher.

The results underline the stellar success of Nintendo Co., the Japanese maker behind Super Mario and Pokemon games. The Kyoto-based manufacturer has pursued a strategy to reverse the gradual decline that has ailed the industry in recent years by introducing games that appeal to newcomers, including the elderly and women.

Nintendo said Wednesday its "Wii Fit" game, which uses a board resembling a weight scale to help people exercise in the living room with yoga positions, hula hoops and push-ups, already sold a million units in Japan in a month since going on sale in December.

Overseas sales plans for the hit game aren't decided yet, company spokesman Ken Toyoda said.

Enterbrain, which publishes game magazines, found hardware and software gaming sales in Japan totaled 687.76 billion yen (US$6.3 billion) in 2007, up 10 percent from the previous year.

The top-selling machine in Japan was the Nintendo DS portable machine, with 7.1 million units sold last year, according to Enterbrain's research released earlier this week. Since going on sale in 2004, sales of the Nintendo DS have totaled 21 million in Japan, it said.

The No. 2 selling machine here in 2007 was also from Nintendo, the Wii, which has been a sellout around the world since arriving at stores in late 2006. In Japan, 3.6 million Wiis were sold last year, for a cumulative 4.6 million, Enterbrain said.

Offerings from rival Sony did not fare as well -- at 3 million for the PlayStation Portable and 1.2 million for the PlayStation 3 in 2007. Only 257,800 of Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox360 machines were sold in Japan last year.

Ranking No. 1 in game software was "Wii Sports," which has players using the wandlike remote to play virtual tennis, boxing and other sports, at 1.9 million sold last year in Japan.

The game is typical of how the Wii has emerged a hit with such offerings that aren't stereotypical shoot-em-ups. The DS handheld has also wooed new people with its touch panel and brainteaser puzzles, educational material, cooking recipes and other easy-to-play software.

Nintendo President Satoru Iwata told Japan's top business daily, The Nikkei, the company will continue that strategy by offering wireless downloads for the DS, such as searches for purchases in a mall and train schedules at a station.

"We don't need to stick to a narrow definition of games," he said in an interview published Wednesday.

Nintendo said previously it had shipped 13.2 million Wii units worldwide through the end of September, and is targeting a cumulative 23 million Wiis by March 31, the end of its fiscal year.

Sony said previously it sold 5.6 million PS3s worldwide as of the end of September, although the company has since reported robust holiday season sales in North America at 1.2 million. The Japanese electronics and entertainment company has not yet given a new worldwide number.

Microsoft has sold 17.7 million Xbox 360 consoles globally over the last two years.

The eldest son of independent legislator Shingo Nishimura plunged to his death from a housing complex in Tokyo on Wednesday in an apparent suicide, police said.

The 26-year-old son of Nishimura plunged from the 20th floor of the 28-story housing complex for House of Representatives members in the Akasaka district of Minato-ku, local police said. He was rushed to a hospital where he died from massive injuries he sustained to his whole body.

Local police suspect that the younger Nishimura took his own life and are investigating the motives for his suicide.

The son was aspiring to pass the state bar examination while working at a company, according to acquaintances.

Legislator Nishimura was elected to the Lower House for the first time in 1993, and is now in his fifth term. He was expelled from the largest opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) after being arrested for getting paid for lending his license as a lawyer to another person. In February last year, he was handed a suspended prison term over the case.

Despite his conviction, Nishimura has stayed on as a legislator even though the chamber has adopted a motion urging him to resign.

HANDA, Aichi -- A man attacked a pachinko parlor employee with a metal bar and stole more than 3 million yen in the store's takings from him, police said.

At around 11 p.m. on Tuesday, a 29-year-old employee of Pachinko Stadium Koraku Handa was returning to the parlor from its prize-cash exchange booth when a man approached him and hit him with a metal bar, local police said.

After he fell down, the robber stole a bag containing about 3.34 million yen in cash from him. The robber fled the scene in a car driven by another man. The employee suffered slight wounds to his left hand.

The mugger appeared to be aged 30 to 35, was about 170 centimeters tall and was thin. He was wearing a jacket with a black hood.

An elderly woman and her ailing daughter have been found dead at a condominium in Tokyo, police said.

Junko Miura, 90, and her oldest daughter Yoshiko Ando, 68, were found dead at their condominium in Tokyo's Shinagawa-ku at around 6:45 p.m. on Tuesday. Miura's second daughter, 66, found the two dead on their respective beds when she visited their home.

Police suspect that Ando, who was taking care of her aging mother, had died from illness before her mother subsequently died from old age.

Miura became physically handicapped after she suffered from a stroke a few years ago, while Ando was suffering from asthma. Drugs for asthma treatment were left alongside Ando's bed, police said.

A female home helper who was taking care of Miura and Ando from the end of last year until Jan. 1 told police that they had looked fine. Miura's second daughter reported to police on Tuesday that she was unable to contact her mother and sister on the phone and found the two of them dead upon visiting their home along with police officers.

Miura's home was locked and there were no traces of intrusion. Investigators will determine their cause of death by conducting autopsies on their bodies.

TOMAKOMAI, Hokkaido -- A newspaper deliveryman has been arrested for emailing a female university student photos of his private parts and messages asking her to have sex with him, police said.

Osamu Sotozaki, 57, an employee of a sales agency for the Asahi Shimbun national daily, stands accused of violating the Anti-Stalking Law.

Sotozaki fell in love with the victim, a 23-year-old university student living in Tomakomai, when he visited her in July 2007 to collect a subscription fee, according to investigators.

He obtained her mobile phone number from the agency's list of customers, and sent numerous e-mails to her, local police said. The e-mails included photos of his private parts and messages asking her to have sex with him.

The incident came to light after the woman consulted with local police.

MATSUSAKA, Mie -- A ceramic artist died after crashing his car into a guardrail at an expressway parking area here, police said.

At around 2:40 p.m. on Tuesday, a van driven by Koji Umemura, 81, crashed into a guardrail near the entrance of the Ureshino Parking Area on the Ise Expressway in Matsusaka, local police said.

Umemura died about 90 minutes later while seven passengers including his 79-year-old wife Yukiko received treatment at a hospital.

Umemura is known as the ceramic artist Seiho.

KAMISU, Ibaraki -- A driver with a major trucking company has been arrested for raping a woman to whom he had earlier delivered a parcel, police said.

Kiyotaka Sakuma, 38, an employee of Yamato Transport Co. living in Choshi, Chiba Prefecture, stands accused of rape and trespassing.

"I assaulted her after falling for her when I delivered a parcel," Sakuma was quoted as telling investigators.

He admitted that he was involved in more than 10 similar incidents. Police are grilling him in a bid to press further charges against him.

His employer apologized for the incident. "We express our profound apologies to the victim. We will do our utmost to restore the public's trust in us," Yamato Transport President Makoto Kigawa said in a statement released on its Web site.

In late December 2006, Sakuma sneaked into the home of a woman in her 20s in Kamisu, covered her face and threatened to kill her if she cried for help. He then sexually assaulted her, local police said.

More than 10 similar incidents occurred in Kamisu between May 2005 and November 2007, police said.

TOKYO (AP) -- Sony BMG will start selling music downloads free of copy-protection safeguards later this month in North America, as even the last holdout among the major record labels crumbled to the growing trend.

Sony BMG Music Entertainment said in a statement that some digital albums will be available through a new download service called Platinum MusicPass starting Jan. 15 in the U.S., and late January in Canada.

A Sony Corp. official in Tokyo, requesting anonymity because he is not authorized to speak officially for Sony BMG, confirmed the company's move toward the MP3 format in the U.S., but said that similar moves aren't in the works in Japan and elsewhere.

Music files in the MP3 format can be copied to computers and burned onto CDs without restriction. They can also be played on most digital music players, including Apple Inc.'s iPod as well as on personal computers.

As a Japanese electronic manufacturer that also has major entertainment businesses, including its music joint venture with Bertelsmann AG, Sony has long resisted the global trend toward MP3 files.

Tokyo-based Sony has stuck to what the industry calls Digital Rights Management, or DRM, which are like software coding that prevents copying downloaded tunes by making some songs incompatible with some digital players.

But CD sales around the world have been on a skid as more people opt to purchase their music online, such as Apple's iTunes Music Store.

Sony has taken a beating in digital players with the booming popularity of the iPod, even in its home Japanese market.

Sony BMG's MusicPass will offer 37 titles at first, including rock, pop and other genres, according to the company. But people must first buy a card available at 4,500 retail outlets across the U.S., including Best Buy, Target and others, it said.

The US$12.99 cards will have a password identification number on the back and so the people will be able to visit an Internet site for MusicPass to download audio files, Sony BMG said.

"We see MusicPass as a great way to bring digital music to the physical retail space. We believe it will have strong appeal for a broad range of customers, and that it will ultimately expand both the digital and physical markets for music," said Thomas Hesse, president of global digital business and U.S. sales at Sony BMG, in a statement.

Last month, Warner Music Group, which had also resisted selling music online without copy protection, agreed to sell its tunes on Amazon's digital music store.

Universal Music Group and EMI Music Group PLC have earlier signed to sell large portions of their catalogs as MP3 files, as have many independent labels.

"The introduction of MusicPass is an important part of Sony BMG's ongoing campaign to bring its artists' music to fans in new and innovative ways," said Hesse.

One of the albums offered is Celine Dion's "Taking Chances." Sony BMG's other artists include Bob Dylan, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez and Avril Lavigne.

TOKYO (AP) -- Sharp's president said Tuesday the Japanese electronics maker will fight global warming by making environmentally friendly TV displays and solar energy products -- its two core businesses.

Sharp President Mikio Katayama said the company will strive to develop the world's "No. 1" liquid crystal displays for flat-panel TVs. He said one of the key benefits of LCD TVs is that they consume less electricity than fatter conventional TVs.

Sharp Corp. is one of the world's biggest manufacturers of liquid crystal display TVs along with Japanese rival Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea. It is also a leading maker of solar cells, which generate electricity using sunlight.

"We plan to contribute to preventing global warming through clean energy," Katayama told reporters at a Tokyo hotel.

Sharp said it will boost production of LCD panels for the manufacture of its own TVs and other brands.

Sharp had been planning to raise production at its LCD plant from 60,000 sheets a month to 90,000 a month this year. It will now start that in July, earlier than originally planned, to meet growing demand for flat panel TVs, Katayama said. That will also help cut costs, he said.

Competition has been intensifying among TV producers, with various makers vying to show ever larger and ever thinner panels to woo consumers with elegant TVs that can be hung on walls or placed on thin poles.

LCD TVs will account for about 45 percent of overall worldwide demand for televisions this year, Katayama said in a New Year's news conference that laid out the company's strategy for the year.

He said LCD TVs consume about 60 percent of the energy used by picture tube TVs, and Sharp is developing new LCD TVs that will trim that to about 50 percent.

Sharp has already shown a 52-inch prototype LCD panel just 29 millimeters thick that consumes less energy than today's LCD or plasma display panel sets. On Tuesday, it showed a 65-inch prototype panel that's the same thickness.

TOKYO (AP) -- Sharp's president said Tuesday the Japanese electronics maker will fight global warming by making environmentally friendly TV displays and solar energy products -- its two core businesses.

Sharp President Mikio Katayama said the company will strive to develop the world's "No. 1" liquid crystal displays for flat-panel TVs. He said one of the key benefits of LCD TVs is that they consume less electricity than fatter conventional TVs.

Sharp Corp. is one of the world's biggest manufacturers of liquid crystal display TVs along with Japanese rival Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea. It is also a leading maker of solar cells, which generate electricity using sunlight.

"We plan to contribute to preventing global warming through clean energy," Katayama told reporters at a Tokyo hotel.

Sharp said it will boost production of LCD panels for the manufacture of its own TVs and other brands.

Sharp had been planning to raise production at its LCD plant from 60,000 sheets a month to 90,000 a month this year. It will now start that in July, earlier than originally planned, to meet growing demand for flat panel TVs, Katayama said. That will also help cut costs, he said.

Competition has been intensifying among TV producers, with various makers vying to show ever larger and ever thinner panels to woo consumers with elegant TVs that can be hung on walls or placed on thin poles.

LCD TVs will account for about 45 percent of overall worldwide demand for televisions this year, Katayama said in a New Year's news conference that laid out the company's strategy for the year.

He said LCD TVs consume about 60 percent of the energy used by picture tube TVs, and Sharp is developing new LCD TVs that will trim that to about 50 percent.

Sharp has already shown a 52-inch prototype LCD panel just 29 millimeters thick that consumes less energy than today's LCD or plasma display panel sets. On Tuesday, it showed a 65-inch prototype panel that's the same thickness.

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- A 150-inch high-definiton plasma TV unveiled by Panasonic is the world's largest to date, the Japanese consumer electronics company claimed Monday at the International Consumer Electronics Show.

The plasma panel features an 8.84 million pixel image resolution. Its screen is the equivalent of nine 50-inch sets, with an effective viewing area of 11 feet (3.3 meters), the company said. It's a step up from Panasonic's 103-inch version, which cost $70,000 when it launched. The company did not say in a news release how much the 150-inch panel will cost.

Panasonic's other prototypes introduced at CES include a 42-inch panel that uses half the energy but stays as bright as its predecessor, and an ultra-thin 50-inch panel that is less than 2.5 centimeters thick, the company said.

Both plasma and LCD TVs have been selling well in the U.S. as consumers are switching out their old tube sets so they can watch high-definition TV and movies.

Panasonic also said it plans to bring videos from Google Inc.'s YouTube directly to its line of Internet-enabled high-definition plasma TV sets. The new Viera HDTVs also provide access to Google's photo sharing site, Picasa.

Panasonic is a unit of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co.

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- HDTV manufacturers are trying to make the task of buying an HDTV set much more difficult than just choosing between LCD and plasma, 42 inches or 46 inches.

To stand out amid fierce competition, they are adding exotic features, and even a little bit of color to the plain black bezels that have been de rigeur. They are also chasing each other to zero -- zero thickness, that is. Apparently, you cannot be too thin if you are a TV.

All the major Asian brands revealed new sets at the International Consumer Electronics Show, which started Monday. Most of the innovation comes from the prestigious names, like Sony, Pioneer, Panasonic and Toshiba, which are trying to keep HDTVs from becoming a commodity product. If one 42-inch LCD is the same as another, the buyer is going to be looking mostly at price, and that kills the manufacturer's margins.

This happened to DVD players years ago: when unknown Asian manufacturers were able to slap together players and sell them for $50, Sony could not make money in the category.

"The goal is to break away from the commoditized market," said Ken Shioda, general manager of display products for Pioneer.

Pioneer Corp. is one of the companies working to put its sets on a diet: it demonstrated a plasma TV with a thickness of just 9 millimeters, claiming it is the thinnest 50-inch set ever. It is just a prototype, however. Pioneer said sets that thin would not be on the market this year, but possibly next.

Hitachi Ltd. is showing off an LCD display that is twice as thick: three-fourths of an inch. That is also a prototype, but the company is bringing LCDs that are 1.5 inches (3.8 centimeters) thick to the U.S. market in the second quarter after launching them in Japan in December.

The ultimate in thinness is achievable with a completely different screen technology: organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs. Sony Corp. announced it will soon start selling the first OLED screen in the U.S. It's just 3 millimeters, or one-eighth of an inch thick. The catch -- actually, the first of two catches -- is that the screen area is also minimal, at 11 inches diagonally. The second catch is the price tag: about $2,500.

A set's thinness may not be readily apparent in an electronics store, so some manufacturers are adding color to the bezels of the TVs. But their move away from the all-black scheme is timid. You won't find a leaf green or sky blue HDTV set to match your wallpaper anytime soon. A slight touch of red is as far as they'll go: both Samsung Electronics Co. and LG Electronics Inc. are adding accents of that color to their otherwise black LCD bezels.

The purchase process for flat-panel TVs is no longer dominated by men saying "give me the biggest TV I can get," said Tim Baxter, executive vice president of sales and marketing for the consumer electronics division of Samsung Electronics America. TVs now need to pass muster with women, who look at whether the design fits in a room, he added.

On the technical side, sets with the so-called "Full HD" or "1080p" resolution became the standard for middle- to high-end LCD and rear-projection sets last year, and plasma sets with that resolution have also appeared. There is no real space for improvement in that direction: 1080p, or 1,920 by 1,080 pixels, is the maximum resolution of today's high-definition discs, and higher than broadcast HD signals.

Instead, another feature looks set to become a standard in 2008: sets that show 120 frames per second. HDTV signals are usually broadcast in 30 frames per second, and movies are shot at 24 frames per second, so the usefulness of a set showing more frames isn't immediately obvious. But 120 hertz sets compute frames to insert between the signal's frames, yielding visibly smoother motion and sharper pictures in action scenes.

"120 hertz is the new 1080p," said Scott Ramirez, vice president of TV marketing at Toshiba.

High image refresh rates are also useful for three-dimensional imaging. Viewers wearing glasses with liquid-crystal shutters that alternately black out and reveal the TV set, in sync with the image refresh rate, can be shown different images for the right and left eyes if the refresh rate is high enough. That produces a stereoscopic, or 3-D effect.

Samsung brought out 3-D-capable rear-projection sets last year. At CES, it announced plasma sets with the same capability.

There aren't many movies available in 3-D, but many video games can be played in 3-D. Texas Instruments Inc., which makes the core components of many rear-projection sets, introduced another technology at the show that uses the same elements to help gamers out: DualView. In essence, two gamers wearing shutter-equipped glasses will be able look at the same screen but see different images. That means the screen doesn't have to be divided down the middle for two-player gaming. That should prevent the cheating that occurs when one player peaks that the other's half of the screen, TI said.

OSHU, Iwate -- East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) has rejected calls to stick up posters promoting a local "naked festival," saying there are many women who aren't comfortable seeing men naked.

The Oshu Municipal Government had sought permission from the Morioka branch of JR East to display the posters advertising Kokuseki Temple's Somin Festival at stations, but JR East said the posters could not be displayed unless the images were changed.

"As sexual harassment becomes more of a problem, the standards for displaying posters in public spaces are becoming stricter," a representative of the Morioka branch of JR East explained. "It wasn't just that it was out of line because there was nakedness; the pictures showed things that were particularly unpleasant for women, such as chest hair, and it was decided that showing them things they didn't want to see was sexual harassment."

In the festival, crowds of men wearing nothing but loincloths participate in scrambles using sacks called sominbukuro. The festival, which has continued for about 1,000 years, is held in the hope of warding off plagues and producing bumper crops. This year, it will be held between the evening of Feb. 13 and early Feb. 14.

The poster in question combines three photos, showing a close-up of a bearded man with a hairy chest, and men in the background wearing loincloths.

The city retouched some of the loincloths, but decided that it would be difficult to completely alter images as JR had requested. It has reportedly decided to decrease the number of posters by about 200 to 1,400, and will display them in the city and in the Tokyo metropolitan area instead.

Oshu Municipal Government official Yuzuru Sasaki said that efforts to liven up the festival would continue in spite of the setback.

"The number of tourists might drop, but we want to display the posters in the city and ask tourist facilities in the metropolitan area to display them to pump up the festival," he said.

UJI, Kyoto -- Local police failed to make any arrests in an assault case for 2 1/2 years even though they had identified the suspects, and the leader of the group of suspects died before they had taken action, it has been learned.

Police identified six suspects soon after the crime, which took place in Uji, Kyoto Prefecture, in June 2005, but did not immediately arrest them. In November 2007, they finally arrested five of the suspects on suspicion of inflicting bodily injuries on the victim, but the leader of the group had already died in an accident.

Kyoto Prefectural Police told the female victim the case had received "low priority." The Kyoto District Public Prosecutors Office is believed to have pointed out delays in the police investigation, sending a letter to prefectural police regarding their response, but police said they could not disclose the contents.

In the attack, the six suspects kicked and hit a woman they got into an argument with at a karaoke parlor in the predawn hours of June 6, 2005, leaving her with a broken jaw.

At the end of the same month, the woman filed a police complaint. Police identified the suspects, but were reportedly kept busy with daily duties, and didn't immediately arrest them. The leader of the group of suspects died in an accident in December 2006.

A prefectural police spokesman said police had not simply abandoned the case.

"It was true that we were caught up with our duties, but we didn't leave the case unattended; we made the arrests at the stage when the facts became clear," the official said.

The Japanese government is set to consider a permanent law on the dispatch of Self-Defense Force (SDF) troops on overseas missions, government officials said.

The agreement was reached during a meeting Tuesday between Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura, Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura at the prime minister's official residence.

The government is poised to ask the largest opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) to support such a bill, and seek Diet approval within fiscal 2008.

The government presently submits a new bill to the Diet whenever it decides to dispatch SDF troops on overseas missions.

The Anti-Terrorism Special Measures Bill, under which SDF troops will resume their mission to refuel U.S. military vessels involved in the fight against terrorism, is expected to become law during the current Diet session. However, it is expected to be replaced by a new permanent law after it is enacted, according to the officials.

A doctor was arrested Tuesday for having a female staff member prescribe a mood-altering drug without a medical license to a patient who wanted to lose weight.

The Osaka District Public Prosecutors Office and other investigators arrested Shingo Kazemoto, 44, a doctor and head of the "Medical Salon" group based in Tokyo's Shinjuku-ku, on suspicion of violating the Medical Practitioners Law.

Also arrested was Sayori Okamura, 29, head of the Roppongi Medical Salon in Tokyo's Minato-ku.

Kazemoto had Okamura prescribe a total of 120 tablets of the mood-altering drug "Mazindol" for a female patient at the Roppongi Medical Salon on three separate occasions between May and September in 2006, according to investigators. Mazindol also has the effect of suppressing one's appetite.

Okamura has admitted to most of the allegations, while Kazemoto has denied his role, saying, "I certainly had the drug handed to the client through my employee, but I prescribed the drug appropriately after examining the client as a doctor."

Students at public elementary and junior high schools in the capital returned to school on Tuesday after New Year holidays.

In Tokyo, 1,013 public elementary schools and 433 public junior high schools held ceremonies to mark the start of the new winter term on Tuesday. Public schools also resumed in neighboring Kanagawa and Saitama prefectures the same day, while schools in Chiba Prefecture began the new term a day earlier.

At the Sanno Elementary School in Tokyo's Ota-ku, third-grade students spoke about their activities during the winter break, such as traveling and visiting their parents' hometowns.

The students also submitted calligraphy assignments they worked on during their winter vacations and talked about their New Year's resolutions.

A high-ranking official with the Japan-U.S. Center for Peace and Cultural Exchange denied having received more than 100 million yen from scandal-hit defense contractor Yamada Corp. during testimony made in the Diet on Tuesday.

Naoki Akiyama, 58, executive director of the Japan-U.S. Center for Peace and Cultural Exchange, denied the allegations as he stood as an unsworn witness before the House of Councillors Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense.

Former Yamada Corp. executive Motonobu Miyazaki, 69, has told investigators that he handed about 100 million yen to Akiyama in return for winning a public works contract.

Akiyama also denied allegations that he accepted approximately 30 million yen from Yamada Corp. in connection with the supply of engines for a next-generation transport aircraft to the Defense Ministry.

Akiyama reportedly served as a liaison between the defense industry and related Diet members.

The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office earlier raided the office of the Japan-U.S. Center for Peace and Cultural Exchange, a corporation based in Tokyo's Chiyoda-ku, in connection with the bribery scandal involving former top Defense Ministry bureaucrat Takemasa Moriya.

Moriya, 63, former administrative vice defense minister, allegedly received millions of yen in bribes from Yamada Corp.

An independent publisher has filed for protection from its creditors with liabilities of about 2 billion yen, company officials said.

Singpoosha, based in Tokyo's Minato-ku, filed for court protection under the Civil Rehabilitation Law with the Tokyo District Court on Monday.

"We've lost a considerable number of self-publishing authors to the point where we would not be able to sustain our business. There were numerous misjudgments on the part of our operators," Yoshiyuki Matsuzaki, president of Singpoosha, said as he expressed an apology during a press conference in Tokyo on Monday.

"We will complete our publishing commitments and distribute the books that have already been published," he added, referring to the approximately 1,100 writers under contract with the publisher.

Company officials said the firm will hold an explanatory meeting for general creditors on Wednesday and another one for contract writers before the end of the month.

OITA -- A junior high school boy found dead outside a housing complex here Tuesday may have committed suicide by leaping from the building, investigators said.

At around 5:30 a.m. on Tuesday, the 15-year-old boy was found lying on the roof above the entrance hall of an apartment complex in Oita by a family member. He was rushed to a hospital where he died from massive head injuries.

Investigators suspect that he may have leaped from the structure and landed on the roof.

No suicide note has been found. The boy, a third-year junior high school student, appeared worried about his school grades, investigators said.

FUKUOKA -- A driver who caused the death of three young children in a car accident on a bridge here in August 2006 was handed a 7 1/2 year prison sentence on Tuesday after a court threw out a charge bearing a heavier penalty.

The court handed the prison sentence to 23-year-old Futoshi Imabayashi, a former Fukuoka Municipal Government worker, after convicting him of professional negligence resulting in death and injury, which carries a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment, driving under the influence of alcohol and fleeing the accident scene.

Public prosecutors had tried to form a case against Imabayashi by accusing him of the crime of dangerous driving resulting in death and injury, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years' imprisonment. However, the court did not find that Imabayashi was heavily drunk before the accident, and was unable to conclude that it would have been difficult for him to drive normally at the time of the accident.

Justice Ministry officials said it was rare for a district court to dismiss a charge of dangerous driving resulting in death and injury and instead apply a charge of professional negligence resulting in death and injury. Public prosecutors plan to file an appeal against the ruling.

The accident occurred on a bridge over Hakata Bay in Fukuoka at about 10:50 p.m. on Aug. 25, 2006. Imabayashi's vehicle, traveling at a speed of about 100 kilometers per hour, hit a sport-utility vehicle carrying 34-year-old Akio Ogami and his family, knocking it into the bay and causing three children in the vehicle, aged between 1 and 4, to drown, according to the charges against him. Instead of stopping at the scene, he drove for about 300 meters, leading to a hit-and-run charge.

The focus of the trial had been on how much the alcohol that Imabayashi had consumed prior to the accident had affected his driving ability. Prosecutors said that Imabayashi had consumed 350 milliliters of beer and 540 milliliters of shochu liquor at his home and at a restaurant and was heavily drunk, making his driving "extremely dangerous."

Lawyers for Imabayashi, however, pointed out that his alcohol level was about 0.25 milligrams per liter of expelled breath when he was tested roughly 40 minutes after the accident, and argued that he was only slightly drunk and it was therefore not difficult for him to drive.

In December last year the Fukuoka District Court ordered public prosecutors to add additional charges of professional negligence resulting in death and injury and violating the Road Traffic Law by drinking and driving. Prosecutors then applied to change the charges, and the court accepted the request.

A court has acquitted a man of molesting a woman on a train in Tokyo on the grounds that someone else may have committed the crime.

"The victim did not see the culprit. The train was packed at the time and there is a possibility that another person may have committed the crime," Tokyo District Court Judge Toshitaka Ito said as he handed down the ruling.

The man was indicted for molesting a woman on a Tokyu Railway Denen-Toshi Line train in Tokyo in April 2006. Prosecutors had demanded that he be jailed for six months.

The defendant pleaded not guilty to the charges throughout his trial.

KITAKYUSHU -- Three workers died in a tunnel here from a lack of oxygen during water service works on Monday, police said.

A local fire station received an emergency call from a worker at a water pipe construction site in Yahatanishi-ku, Kitakyushu, at around 3:17 p.m., reporting that three colleagues had collapsed in a water works tunnel.

Rescue workers transported them to a hospital where they were confirmed dead. Police are investigating the accident, suspecting that it may constitute professional negligence resulting in death.

Local police believe that the three died from a lack of oxygen.

KOGA, Ibaraki -- Two people died in a fire that burned down an elderly man's home here in the early hours of Tuesday, police said.

At around 2:05 a.m. on Tuesday, a fire broke out at the home of pensioner Shiro Nakamura, 75, in Koga and burned down the two-story wooden structure, local police said.

Two bodies were later pulled out of the debris of the house. Investigators suspect that the bodies are those of Nakamura and his 68-year-old wife Hisako and are trying to confirm their identities.

The couple's 45-year-old son who lived with them escaped unhurt.

A member of the popular rock band GLAY faces negligence charges over a traffic accident that slightly injured a cyclist, police said.

Police have sent an investigation report to prosecutors, accusing Teru, 36, whose real name is Teruhiko Kobashi, of negligent driving resulting in injury. Prosecutors will decide whether to indict him after investigating the case.

A car driven by Teru hit a woman in her 20s riding a bicycle at an intersection in the Aobadai district of Meguro-ku, Tokyo, on the morning of Dec. 7, investigators said. The woman suffered slight injuries that took about 10 days to heal.

SHIBATA, Miyagi -- A woman is suspected of strangling her bed-ridden father before committing suicide, investigators said.

A suicide note reading, "I'm tired of caring for my father. I'm sorry for causing trouble," was found on a table in the living room of their home in Shibata, leading local police to treat the case as murder-suicide.

At around 6:55 p.m. on Monday, Shigeko Sato, 59, and her 86-year-old father Sadao, were found dead in their home by her 34-year-old daughter.

Sadao was lying dead with a scarf around his neck while his daughter had hanged herself in the bathroom, police said.

Sato had cared for bed-ridden Sadao over the past 16 years, local police said.

TOKYO (AP) -- Japan's domestic auto sales fell to a 35-year low last year as the nation faced high gasoline prices, limited income growth and shrinking demand, an industry group said Monday.

Sales of new cars, trucks and buses declined 7.6 percent to 3.434 million vehicles in 2007, the Japan Automobile Dealers' Association said in a statement. The figures do not include sales of minicars and minitrucks.

The result, which marked the fourth straight annual decline, was the lowest since 1972, when sales totaled 3.406 million vehicles.

The data showed that the world's third-biggest auto market is slow to respond to efforts by some Japanese car makers to spark local demand by boosting their offerings of new models. Japan's largest automaker, Toyota Motor Corp., has introduced nine models since last May but estimates a 6-percent drop in its domestic sales in 2007.

The nation's new vehicles sales in December alone fell 7.1 percent from a year ago to 236,142 vehicles, down for the first time in three months, the association said. And the outlook for the domestic market remains gloomy.

Another industry group, Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association, has put its domestic sales forecast for this year at 3.427 million vehicles -- excluding minivehicles -- down 0.2 percent from sales for 2007.

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- JVC Americas Corp. said it will offer a new series of LCD televisions with built-in docks for Apple Inc.'s popular iPod media player.

The dock will allow consumers to play music and video from their iPods on JVC's P-Series TVs, the Japanese company said in a press release Sunday. The iPod, which charges while it is in the dock, can be controlled with the TV remote.

During music playback, artist and song information is displayed on the television screen. Consumers also can view photos stored on their iPod on the TV screen and during television programming they can play music from the iPod.

JVC plans to debut 32-inch (81-centimeter) and 42-inch (107-centimeter) models in March. A 47-inch (119-centimeter) model is scheduled to launch in April, with a 52-inch model following in the summer.

Except for the 32-inch model, which offers 768p resolution, the P-Series TVs offer 1080p resolution -- the highest quality currently available.

The company did not disclose suggested retail prices.

JVC Americas is a subsidiary of Victor Company of Japan Ltd.

TOKYO (AP) -- Stocks fell for a fourth day Monday amid lingering concern over the slowdown of the U.S. economy.

Japan's benchmark Nikkei index lost 190.86 points, or 1.3 percent, on the Tokyo Stock Exchange to 14,500.55 points on Monday, its lowest since July 18, 2006. On Friday, the first day of the 2008 trading year, the index tumbled 4.03 percent.

Stocks were lower in Tokyo as traders took their cues from Wall Street, where shares fell Friday after the government's much-anticipated employment report showed weaker-than-expected job growth and a rise in the unemployment rate.

"Today's sell-off was due to concrete evidence that the housing market woes have finally started eroding the U.S. economy," said Masatoshi Sato, senior strategist at Mizuho Investors Securities.

Traders sold steel and shipping issues. Shipbuilder Kawasaki Kisen fell 5.8 percent to 961 yen, while Nippon Steel shed 2.8 percent to 649 yen.

Sony rose 0.7 percent to 5,830 yen, and Matsushita Electric Industrial added 0.7 percent to 2,190 yen after U.S. movie studio Warner Bros. said that it will support Sony's Blu-ray format for next-generation DVDs. Matsushita supports the format.

Tokyo's broader Topix index of all shares on the exchange's first section, lost 19.20 points, or 1.36 percent, to 1,392.71.

In currencies, the dollar was trading at 109.00 yen at 2:50 p.m. (0550 GMT) Monday, up from 108.45 yen late Friday in New York. In late December, it was trading above 114 yen.

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Sony Corp. said it is introducing to the U.S. market a high-quality organic LED television only as thick as three stacked credit cards.

The 11-inch (28-centimeter) XEL-1 television, which the company announced Sunday will go on sale this month, is Sony's first television for the U.S. to use organic light-emitting diode technology, which enables superior picture quality on super-thin displays. The company also is demonstrating a prototype 20-inch (51-centimeter) version at the Consumer Electronics Show this week in Las Vegas.

The XEL-1 has a contrast ratio -- the difference between maximum and minimum brightness -- of 1 million to one, because pixels can be turned off completely for a near-perfect black. That compares with 30,000 to one for a good conventional flat-panel TV, which cannot show a perfect black.

The high picture quality comes at a hefty price: about $2,500 for the XEL-1. It sold for $1,700 at its launch in Japan in December.

SAITAMA (AP) -- Japanese striker Naohiro Takahara is to join J-League club Urawa Reds after severing ties with Bundesliga side Eintracht Frankfurt.

Urawa announced the acquisition of Takahara on Sunday. Takahara's contract with Frankfurt was not due to expire until 2009, and the Reds are expected to pay a transfer fee for the 28-year-old forward.

Takahara joined Frankfurt after the 2006 World Cup and scored 11 goals in his first season with the club but struggled with knee problems in his second season.

Takahara, who scored four times to help Japan reach the semifinals of last year'