The top or most interesting stories from Japan for January 15.
– Japan’s Cabinet has approved the ¥96.3 trillion budget (approx USD$815.40 billion), with spending up (primarily on social security), it indicates the Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government has yet to control expenditure.
At the same time the government is set to collect its highest in tax revenue since 1991, with Japan’s companies slowly coming back. The next step is for the Diet to approve the budget, which Abe hopes they will do “as soon as possible”. (Reuters, Japan Times, Japan News)
– Whilst expenditure on the whole is up – with the highest spending on defence since 2002 – Japan’s foreign aid budget is cut for the 16th year in a row but is spending more on promoting Japanese culture and language overseas.
At the same time, Cabinet has approved a 40% increase to overseas travel expenditure for senior government officials, including Abe and Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida.
– In perhaps an obvious sign of displeasure , the central government has cut the budget for Okinawa’s economic development aid. Okinawa recently vote in a new governor who strongly opposes recent proposals to expand the US base there. But the cut, as The Japan News reasons (par 14-5), was made due to unused money left in previous budgets.
– Meanwhile, in the presidential runoff for Japan’s leading opposition, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ): all three candidates have vowed to improve the number of women in the party. Only 18 members of Japan’s 132-member Diet are women.
– A US-based publisher has refused to make changes to one of its history textbooks after a request by the Japanese government to change its coverage of ‘comfort women’. A statement by the government states the book contains “grave errors and descriptions that conflict with our nation’s stance on the issue of ‘comfort women'”.
– Futaba, an abandoned town in Fukushima Prefecture has agreed to let the central government dump and store radioactive waste there. Futuaba’s residents can’t really return to the town because of the radioactive fallout of the disaster at the nearby by Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, and the government has promised to remove the waste in 30 years.
