Yakuza on the rise again in Japan
ABC Radio. The World Today - 24 May 2006
SHANE MCLEOD: After 15 years in the economic doldrums, things may be finally looking up for Japan. ...For Japan's organised crime gangs, the Yakuza, the return of good times applies to them as well.
Raisuke Miyawaki is a former head of the National Police Agency's organised crime division.
RAISUKE MIYAWAKI: The Yakuza have always had a strong connection to the Japanese real estate business in performing with Jiage - obtaining separately owned properties through coercion, and joining with them into a single developed property.
SHANE MCLEOD: Mr Miyawaki is known as the man who labelled Japan's economic downturn as the 'yakuza recession'.
He pointed out that the bad times had been more prolonged than they might have otherwise been, because of Yakuza links to many of the bad debts being carried by Japan's banks.
Now, with the dark years apparently in the past, things are looking up, and looking like a Yakuza recovery....more...