Article: Japan's world after the wall. (also includes a related article on better relations between North and South Korea)

Japan's world after the Wall

EVEN Japan has now scrawled its signature on the crumbling edifice of the Berlin Wall. On January 8th Mr Toshiki Kaifu, the Japanese prime minister, landed in West Germany. It was the first stop on a ten-day tour that was to take him to seven countries, on both sides of the former iron curtain, plus the Vatican. It was an ambitious schedule--and Mr Kaifu was filling it with ambitious words. He said plainly that Japan intends to do more in the post-cold-war world than simply circulate its goods and money through it. The unstated message was that, with its American ties under growing strain just as the east-west conflict is relaxing, ...