My latest stories for Jane's Defence Weekly

The press office of Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs barred me from covering the Clinton-Matsumoto joint press conference on April 10.

It was really disappointing.

I quit the Asahi Shimbun 12 years ago, because I wanted to send more info from Japan to the rest of the world by working for some foreign media as an English-language writer.

To me, Japan still seems like a "black hole" to receive info from abroad almost unilaterally. As a Japanese citizen I wanted to change this by writing more articles on Japan in English.

Japan is being criticized as providing too little too late info on the Fukushima nuke crisis. I like to help solve this problem as an English-language writer.

But the Ministry of Foreign Affairs barred me from covering the joint press conference by Clinton and Matsumoto on April 10, anyway. The MoFA really disappointed me.

Hey MoFA press people! Here is an accrediation letter, which proves I am the Tokyo correspondent for Jane's Defence Weekly. Take a look at it!

Jane’s Defence Weekly — Accreditation 2011

Three contenders step up for Japan's F-X fighter programme

Analysis: China White Paper hints at platform, strategic developments

Pentagon despatches marines nuclear team to Japan

The history of the big earthquakes and those aftershocks

I compiled the history of the big earthquakes and those aftershocks. As you can see below, the powerful aftershock occurred just two months later at the earliest. So we need to be very cautious about the aftershock this time around.

The name of earthquake                                                   Aftershock

Ansei-Tōkai earthquake on Dec 23, 1854                        Nov 7, 1855
  (M8.4)                                                                             (M7.0〜7.5)

Meiji-Sanriku earthquake on June 15, 1896                      Aug 31, 1896 
  (M8.2〜8.5)                                                                    (M7.2)

Great Kantō earthquake on Sep 1, 1923                           Jan 15, 1924
 (M7.9)                                                                               (M7.3)

Sumatra earthquake on Dec 26, 2004                               Mar 28, 2005
 (M9.1)                                                                               (M8.6)     

Great East Japan earthquake on Mar 11, 2011                             ?
(M9.0)