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- <text id=91TT2827>
- <title>
- Dec. 23, 1991: World Notes:Japan
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1991
- Dec. 23, 1991 Gorbachev:A Man Without A Country
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- WORLD, Page 31
- World Notes
- JAPAN
- A Setback For Miyazawa
- </hdr><body>
- <p> No matter how long Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa hangs on to
- his post, he is not likely to have many weeks as bad as the last
- one. Along with a sharp drop in the Tokyo Stock Exchange,
- declining approval ratings in the polls, and insinuations of
- financial wrongdoings, he suffered a particularly disappointing
- setback when parliament effectively killed a government measure
- to let Japanese soldiers serve overseas in United Nations
- peacekeeping operations. After harsh criticism in the West for
- Japan's failure to participate in the gulf coalition against
- Iraq, Miyazawa was determined to ease his country's strict
- limitations on military service abroad. The bill was approved
- by the Lower House of the Diet after sometimes violent debate,
- but when the Prime Minister tried to push it through the Upper
- House, support drained away.
- </p>
- <p> Miyazawa refused to meet opposition demands for closer
- Diet review of any deployment with the U.N. He lost the backing
- of some in his own party, who feared they would alienate voters
- in next summer's election. "Pacifist sentiment, especially
- among women, is very strong," said Wakako Hironaka, an
- opposition member who supported the bill. "Some people
- mistakenly fear that sending troops overseas, even with the
- United Nations, means the revival of militarism."
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
-
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