Word: yokota
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...hard enough for Shigeru Yokota to know that his only daughter Megumi had suddenly disappeared one day in 1977, almost certainly kidnapped off the street like a string of other Japanese by North Korean agents. But to turn for help to his country's officials?the very people responsible for the safety of Japanese citizens like Megumi?and be met with indifference, or worse: that was a special kind of pain. "At the beginning the government was not supportive at all," says the 73-year-old Yokota, sitting in the lobby of his apartment complex in rainy Kawasaki, a city...
...troops from Okinawa (Japan has long sought to reduce the basing burden on the islands); the relocation of the U.S. Army's I Corps headquarters from Washington state to Camp Zama, an hour outside of Tokyo; the establishment of joint U.S.-Japanese command of the Yokota Air Base; and a pledge by both countries to increase military cooperation, intelligence gathering and training...
...minute later, the plane was advised, "Haneda and Yokota both ready. You can start landing procedures any time." Yokota, a U.S. air base, had already been told by Tokyo air-traffic control, as had Haneda, to be prepared for an emergency landing. But there was no reply from Flight...
...Disputed Remains "Bones of Contention" [April 4] reported that the North Korean government returned to Japan the cremated ashes and bone fragments of Megumi Yokota, a Japanese girl who was kidnapped by the North Koreans in the 1970s and later committed suicide. After running DNA tests, Japanese officials said the remains were not Yokota's, and they blocked North Korean rice shipments in protest. But now they have announced that the remains might be Yokata's. I am deeply shocked that I have heard nothing of that in the Japanese media. From the very beginning, Japan has handled the case...
...turns out the remains might have been Yokota's after all. In February, the British scientific journal Nature published an article in which the scientist who did the tests admitted they were inconclusive-and that the remains could have been contaminated with foreign DNA. "The bones are like stiff sponges that can absorb anything," Teikyo University DNA analyst Yoshii Tomio told a Nature interviewer. The technique Yoshii used, known as "nested PCR," also raised doubts: professional forensics labs in the U.S. don't use it because of the high risk of contamination, according to Terry Melton, a DNA expert...