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The is one of the five national newspapers in Japan. Its circulation, which was 7.96 million for its morning edition and 3.1 million for its evening edition as of June 2010,〔(Japan Audit Bureau of Circulation ).〕 was second behind that of ''Yomiuri Shimbun''. The company has its registered headquarters in Osaka. When Shin-ichi Hakojima was CEO, they tied up with the ''International Herald Tribune'' and published an English-language newspaper, the ''International Herald Tribune/Asahi Shimbun''. It continued from April 2001 until February 2011. It was replaced ''Asahi's'' previous English-language daily, the ''Asahi Evening News''. In 2010, this partnership was dissolved due to unprofitability and the ''Asahi Shimbun'' now operates the ''Asia & Japan Watch'' online portal for English readers.〔 The ''Tribune'' (now known as ''The International New York Times'') cooperates with Asahi on ''Aera English'', a glossy magazine for English learners. ==History== One of Japan's oldest and largest national daily newspapers, the ''Asahi Shimbun'' began publication in Osaka on 25 January 1879 as a small-print, four-page illustrated paper that sold for one sen (a hundredth of a yen) a copy, and had a circulation of approximately 3,000 copies. The three founding officers of a staff of twenty were Kimura Noboru (company president), Murayama Ryōhei (owner), and Tsuda Tei (managing editor). The company's first premises were at Minami-dōri, Edobori in Osaka. On 13 September of the same year, ''Asahi'' printed its first editorial. In 1881, the ''Asahi'' adopted an all-news format, and enlisted Ueno Riichi as co-owner. From 1882, ''Asahi'' began to receive financial support from the Government and Mitsui, and hardened the management base. Then, under the leadership of Ueno, whose brother was one of the Mitsui managers, and Murayama, the ''Asahi'' began its steady ascent to national prominence. On 10 July 1888, the first issue of the ''Tokyo Asahi Shimbun'' was published from the Tokyo office at Motosukiyachō, Kyōbashi. The first issue was numbered No. 1,076 as it was a continuation of three small papers: ''Jiyū no Tomoshibi'', ''Tomoshibi Shimbun'' and ''Mesamashi Shimbun''. On 1 April 1907, the renowned writer Natsume Sōseki, then 41, resigned his teaching positions at Tokyo Imperial University, now Tokyo University, to join the ''Tokyo Asahi Shimbun''. This was soon after the publication of his novels ''Wagahai wa neko de aru'' (''I Am a Cat'') and ''Botchan'', which made him the center of literary attention. On 1 October 1908, ''Osaka Asahi Shimbun'' and ''Tokyo Asahi Shimbun'' were merged into a single unified corporation, ''Asahi Shimbun Gōshi Kaisha'', with a capitalization of approximately 600,000 yen. In 1918, because of its critical stance towards Terauchi Masatake's cabinet during the Rice Riots, government authorities suppressed an article in the ''Osaka Asahi'', leading to a softening of its liberal views, and the resignation of many of its staff reporters in protest. Indeed, the newspaper's liberal position led to its vandalization during the February 26 Incident of 1936, as well as repeated attacks from the right wing throughout this period (and for that matter, throughout its history). From the latter half of the 1930s, ''Asahi'' ardently supported Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe's wartime government (called ''Konoe Shin Taisei'', or Konoe's New Political Order) and criticized capitalism harshly under Taketora Ogata, the Editor in Chief of ''Asahi Shimbun''. Influential editorial writers of ''Asahi'' such as Shintarō Ryū, Hiroo Sassa, and Hotsumi Ozaki (an informant for the famous spy Richard Sorge) were the center members of the Shōwa Kenkyūkai, which was a political think tank for Konoe. Ogata was one of the leading members of the ''Genyōsha'' which had been formed in 1881 by Tōyama Mitsuru. The ''Genyōsha'' was an ultranationalist group of organized crime figures and those with far right-wing political beliefs. Kōki Hirota, who was later hanged as a Class A war criminal, was also a leading member of the ''Genyōsha'' and one of Ogata's best friends. Hirota was the chairman of Tōyama's funeral committee, and Ogata was the vice-chairman. Ryū, who had been a Marxist economist of the Ōhara Institute for Social Research〔(Ohara Institute for Social Research )〕 before he entered ''Asahi'', advocated centrally planned economies in his ''Nihon Keizai no Saihensei'' (Reorganization of Japanese Economies. 1939). And Sassa, a son of ultranationalistic politician Sassa Tomofusa, joined hands with far-right generals (they were called ''Kōdōha'' or Imperial Way Faction) and terrorists who had assassinated Junnosuke Inoue (ex–Minister of Finance), Baron Dan Takuma (chairman of the board of directors of the Mitsui zaibatsu) and Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi to support Konoe. In 1944, they attempted assassination of Prime Minister Hideki Tōjō (one of the leaders of ''Tōseiha'' or Control Group which conflicted with ''Kōdōha'' in the Japanese Army). On 9 April 1937 the ''Kamikaze'', a Mitsubishi aircraft sponsored by the Asahi Shimbun company and flown by Masaaki Iinuma, arrived in London, to the astonishment of the Western world. It was the first Japanese-built aircraft to fly to Europe. On 1 September 1940, the ''Osaka Asahi Shimbun'' and the ''Tokyo Asahi Shimbun'' unified their names into the ''Asahi Shimbun''. On 1 January 1943, the publication of the ''Asahi Shimbun'' was stopped by the government after the newspaper published a critical essay contributed by Seigō Nakano, who was also one of the leading members of the ''Genyōsha'' and Ogata's best friend. On 27 December 1943, Nagataka Murayama, a son-in-law of Murayama Ryōhei and the President of ''Asahi'', removed Ogata from the Editor in Chief and relegated him to the Vice President to hold absolute power in ''Asahi''. On 22 July 1944, Ogata, Vice President of ''Asahi'', became a Minister without Portfolio and the President of Cabinet Intelligence Agency in Kuniaki Koiso's cabinet. On 7 April 1945, Hiroshi Shimomura, former Vice President of ''Asahi'', became the Minister without Portfolio and the President of Cabinet Intelligence Agency in Kantarō Suzuki's cabinet. On 17 August 1945, Ogata became the Minister without Portfolio and the Chief Cabinet Secretary and the President of Cabinet Intelligence Agency in Prince Higashikuni's cabinet. On 5 November 1945, as a way of assuming responsibility for compromising the newspaper's principles during the war, the ''Asahi Shimbun's'' president and senior executives resigned en masse. On 21 November 1946, the newspaper adopted the modern kana usage system (''shin kanazukai''). On 30 November 1949, the ''Asahi Shimbun'' started to publish the serialized cartoon strip Sazae-san by Machiko Hasegawa. This was a landmark cartoon in Japan's postwar era. Between 1954 and 1971, ''Asahi Shimbun'' published a glossy, large-format annual in English entitled ''This is Japan''. Between April and May 1989, the president resigned to take responsibility for the ''Asahi Shimbun coral article hoax incident'' (:ja:朝日新聞珊瑚記事捏造事件). On 2 April 2001, the English-language daily, the ''International Herald Tribune/The Asahi Shimbun'', was first published. On 26 June 2007, Yoichi Funabashi was named the third editor-in-chief of ''Asahi Shimbun''. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Asahi Shimbun」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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