Candidates for the 2007 Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival Queen Program were announced March 18 at the Miyako Hotel in San Francisco’s Japantown.

Six candidates will participate in the program, to be held on Saturday, April 14, 7 p.m., in Theatre 1 at the Sundance Kabuki Cinema, 1881 Post St. in San Francisco’s Japantown.

By ALEC YOSHIO MacDONALD
Nichi Bei Times Contributor

STOCKTON, Calif. — Last Saturday wasn’t the first time Gene Nakamura and Harvey Tahara squared off over a basketball court. Years ago — back in the ‘60s, in fact — they both played in Asian community leagues and used to face each other. Nakamura’s team was from Berkeley, and Tahara’s from Sacramento.

Bay City News Service

The Asian American Bar Association of the Greater Bay Area has joined with San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi and District Attorney Kamala Harris to speak out against a lack of Asian American representation on the Superior Court bench throughout the Bay Area, the organization announced March 14.

By CHIZU OMORI
Nichi Bei Times Columnist

Mike Honda, the California Democrat, is leading an effort to pass a non-binding resolution through Congress to ask the Japanese government to “unequivocally acknowledge and apologize for its (the Japanese Army during World War II) brutal mistreatment” of the women it pressed into sexual slavery. This was the practice of providing “comfort women,” mostly women and girls from Japan’s colonies and occupied territories, for sexual service for its soldiers.

In February 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which would eventually help send 120,000 persons of Japanese descent to U.S. concentration camps during World War II. For nearly 8,000 San Francisco Bay Area Japanese Americans, who were first evacuated to Tanforan Racetrack in San Bruno, this journey marked the beginning of a several years-long revocation of their civil rights.

Idaho Senators Larry Craig and Mike Crapo and Representative Mike Simpson introduced legislation on March 19 to expand the Minidoka Internment National Monument.

By KENJI OGATA
Asahi Shimbun

Yakuza gangs are as active as ever despite a law passed 15 years ago to crack down on organized crime.

The number of gangsters, which ostensibly dropped somewhat after the anti-organized crime law took effect in 1992, has hardly changed, say sources close to both police and gangster groups. And gang-related crimes continue.

WASHINGTON (Kyodo) — The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation’s raid on a Los Angeles office of Japan’s All Nippon Airways Co. March 15 was part of American and European authorities’ joint efforts to investigate suspected cartel activities in the air cargo industry, a Justice Department spokeswoman indicated March 19.

WASHINGTON (Kyodo) — U.S. Ambassador to Japan Thomas Schieffer has said that “comfort women,” who were engaged in providing sex to Japanese soldiers throughout Asia before and during World War II, were rape victims of the Japanese military, the New York Times reported in its electronic edition March 17.

TOKYO (Kyodo) — Japanese and Chinese academics in a joint history study committee on March 20 agreed to take up contentious issues such as the 1937 Nanjing Massacre and visits by Japanese premiers to Yasukuni Shrine in their future discussions, Japanese panel members said.

By KATHY AOKI
Nichi Bei Times

Life is good for Philip Kan Gotanda.

The Sansei playwright sits in the conference room of the American Conservatory Theater’s (A.C.T.) offices in San Francisco during a break in rehearsals for his new play, “After The War.” He continues to re-write his script and work with the actors in a play Gotanda hopes will touch people’s hearts.

By BEN HAMAMOTO
Nichi Bei Times

Filmmaker Justin Lin strolls into the lobby of the Miyako Hotel where his cast is doing interviews. His latest work, “Finishing the Game,” played to a packed house the previous night as the opening night film for the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAFF).