2001 in Japan

Decades:	1980s; 1990s; 2000s; 2010s; 2020s;
See also:	Other events of 2001; History of Japan • Timeline • Years

The following is a list of events that occurred in the year 2001 in Japan. It corresponds to the year Heisei 13 (平成１３年 or 平成十三年) in the Japanese calendar.

Incumbents

Emperor: Akihito^[1]
Prime Minister: Yoshiro Mori (L–Ishikawa) until April 26, Junichiro Koizumi (L–Kanagawa)
Chief Cabinet Secretary: Yasuo Fukuda (L–Gunma)
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court: Shigeru Yamaguchi
Speaker of the House of Representatives: Tamisuke Watanuki (L–Toyama)
President of the House of Councillors: Yutaka Inoue (L–Chiba), reelected August 7
Diet sessions: 151st (regular, January 31 to June 29), 152nd (extraordinary, August 7 to August 10), 153rd (extraordinary, September 27 to December 7)

Governors

Aichi Prefecture: Masaaki Kanda
Akita Prefecture: Sukeshiro Terata
Aomori Prefecture: Morio Kimura
Chiba Prefecture: Takeshi Numata (until 4 April); Akiko Dōmoto (starting 4 April)
Ehime Prefecture: Moriyuki Kato
Fukui Prefecture: Yukio Kurita
Fukuoka Prefecture: Wataru Asō
Fukushima Prefecture: Eisaku Satō
Gifu Prefecture: Taku Kajiwara
Gunma Prefecture: Hiroyuki Kodera
Hiroshima Prefecture: Yūzan Fujita
Hokkaido: Tatsuya Hori
Hyogo Prefecture: Toshitami Kaihara (until 31 July); Toshizō Ido (starting 1 August)
Ibaraki Prefecture: Masaru Hashimoto
Ishikawa Prefecture: Masanori Tanimoto
Iwate Prefecture: Hiroya Masuda
Kagawa Prefecture: Takeki Manabe
Kagoshima Prefecture: Tatsurō Suga
Kanagawa Prefecture: Hiroshi Okazaki
Kochi Prefecture: Daijiro Hashimoto
Kumamoto Prefecture: Yoshiko Shiotani
Kyoto Prefecture: Teiichi Aramaki
Mie Prefecture: Masayasu Kitagawa
Miyagi Prefecture: Shirō Asano
Miyazaki Prefecture: Suketaka Matsukata
Nagano Prefecture: Yasuo Tanaka
Nagasaki Prefecture: Genjirō Kaneko
Nara Prefecture: Yoshiya Kakimoto
Niigata Prefecture: Ikuo Hirayama
Oita Prefecture: Morihiko Hiramatsu
Okayama Prefecture: Masahiro Ishii
Okinawa Prefecture: Keiichi Inamine
Osaka Prefecture: Fusae Ōta
Saga Prefecture: Isamu Imoto
Saitama Prefecture: Yoshihiko Tsuchiya
Shiga Prefecture: Yoshitsugu Kunimatsu
Shiname Prefecture: Nobuyoshi Sumita
Shizuoka Prefecture: Yoshinobu Ishikawa
Tochigi Prefecture: Akio Fukuda
Tokushima Prefecture: Toshio Endo
Tokyo: Shintarō Ishihara
Tottori Prefecture: Yoshihiro Katayama
Toyama Prefecture: Yutaka Nakaoki
Wakayama Prefecture: Yoshiki Kimura
Yamagata Prefecture: Kazuo Takahashi
Yamaguchi Prefecture: Sekinari Nii
Yamanashi Prefecture: Ken Amano

Events

Junichiro Koizumi became prime minister in April.

January

January 6: Nurse Daisuke Mori arrested for an attempted murder of 11-year-old girl.^[2]
January 26: A JR yamanote line train coming into Shin-Ōkubo Station hits and kills a man who fell off the platform and two others who jumped onto the rails to rescue him.
January 31: 2001 Japan Airlines mid-air incident

February

February 9: The fishing boat Ehime Maru is struck by a U.S. submarine and sunk.

March

March 21: The Nintendo Game Boy Advance handheld is released.
March 24: 2001 Geiyo earthquake, kill two people with injure 288 in Hiroshima and Ehime. ^{[citation needed]}
March 27: Hikaru Saeki became the first female star officer (admiral and general) in the history of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF).^[3]
March 31: Universal Studios Japan opens in Osaka.

April

April 1: Sakura Bank and Sumitomo Bank merge to form Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation.
April 6: Japanese government institutes new overtime regulations.
April 24: Junichiro Koizumi defeats Ryutaro Hashimoto in LDP polls to become prime minister.
April 26: Koizumi announces his first cabinet, with Makiko Tanaka as foreign minister and Heizo Takenaka as Minister of State for the Economy.

June

June 8: Osaka school massacre takes place.

July

July 13: Osaka is removed on the first ballot for the site of the 2008 Summer Olympics.
July 20: Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away premieres; it becomes the first anime film to win an Academy Award.
July 29: 2001 Japanese House of Councillors election.

August

August 13: Koizumi visits Yasukuni Shrine, angering China and South Korea.
August 16–26: The sixth World Games are held in Akita.
August 29: The first H-IIA rocket is launched from Tanegashima Space Center.

September

September 1: Myojo 56 building fire kills 44.
September 4: Tokyo DisneySea opens to the public as part of the Tokyo Disney Resort in Urayasu, Chiba, Japan.^[4]
September 11: The first case of Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in Japan is discovered.
September 12: Following the September 11 attacks in the United States, the Nikkei 225 index drops below 10,000 for the first time since 1984.
September 14: The Nintendo GameCube is released.

October

October 1: Ghibli Museum opens.
October 18: The East Japan Railway Company introduces the Suica smart card service to the Tokyo area.

December

December 1: Princess Aiko, potential heiress to the Imperial throne, is born.
December 9: Television performer Masashi Tashiro is arrested for peeping in a male bath-house.
December 21: TIME removes Masashi Tashiro from its "Person of the Year" poll after 2channel users vote the "bad boy" performer into first place.

The Nobel Prize

Ryoji Noyori: 2001 Nobel Prize in Chemistry winner.

Births

January 2: Wakaba Higuchi, figure skater
February 2: Maria Makino, pop singer
February 4: Fūka Haruna, actress
May 24: Noa Tsurushima, actress
May 28: Rikako Sasaki, singer
June 18: Nako Yabuki, singer
June 19: Natsumi Sakai, swimmer
June 25: Yurina Hirate, idol singer
August 4: Seishiro Kato, actor
August 31: Nana Mori, actress
October 1: Pankun, chimpanzee
October 6: Hitomi Honda, singer
November 3: Rōki Sasaki, professional baseball pitcher (Chiba Marines)^{[citation needed]}
December 1: Princess Aiko, the daughter and only child of Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako

Deaths

March 9: Mitsuo Kagawa, archaeologist (b. 1923)
April 7: Yasuhira Kiyohara, lieutenant of the Imperial army (b. 1914)
May 17: Hyōichi Kōno, adventurer (b. 1958)
July 24: Hiroshi Tsuburaya, actor (b. 1964)
July 28: Futaro Yamada, author (b. 1922)
August 25: Ginzō Matsuo, voice actor (b. 1951)
September 9: Shinji Sōmai, film director (b. 1948)
September 28: Isao Inokuma, judoka (b. 1938)
September 30: Takasi Tokioka, zoologist (b. 1913)
October 11: Fuku Akino, painter (b. 1908)^[5]
November 7: Sachiko Hidari, film actress (b. 1930)
November 15: Satoru Kobayashi, film director (b. 1930)
November 30: Kikutaro Baba, malacologist (b. 1905)
December 20: Kōji Nanbara, actor (b. 1927)
December 22: Shizue Kato, politician and activist (b. 1897)
December 29: Takashi Asahina, conductor (b. 1908)

References

^ "Akihito | Biography, Reign, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 27 March 2019.
^ "Killer nurse". Medical Serial Killers. Retrieved 2008-03-21.^{[permanent dead link]}
^ 自衛隊初の女性将官が誕生、佐伯光海将補夫も元海将. 読売新聞東京朝刊. 28 March 2001. p. A. 39.
^ "Tokyo DisneySea Project". OLC Group. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
^ "Obituary: Fuku Akino". The Japan Times Online. 2001-10-12. ISSN 0447-5763. Retrieved 2019-12-11.

[1] "Akihito | Biography, Reign, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 27 March 2019.

[2] "Killer nurse". Medical Serial Killers. Retrieved 2008-03-21.^{[permanent dead link]}

[讀賣-3] 自衛隊初の女性将官が誕生、佐伯光海将補夫も元海将. 読売新聞東京朝刊. 28 March 2001. p. A. 39.

[4] "Tokyo DisneySea Project". OLC Group. Retrieved 2022-11-20.

[5] "Obituary: Fuku Akino". The Japan Times Online. 2001-10-12. ISSN 0447-5763. Retrieved 2019-12-11.

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