The FCCJ has belatedly learned of the death of Huguette Laprise on Aug. 30 last year at La Maison Notre-Dame du Saguenay, Quebec.

We have almost no details other than she died on Aug. 30 and a funeral service was held on Sept. 4 in Chicoutimi.

Huguette was a long-time club member, first as a foreign correspondent with La Presse, then as attaché at the Quebec Delegation in Tokyo and later as an editor with Kyodo News.

During a long and distinguished career, Huguette covered many of the globe's breaking stories, including revelations of massive malfeasance at Hydro Quebec's James Bay project, the Patti Hearst kidnapping and Charles Sobhraj's Asian reign of terror, which resulted in the acclaimed book "L'affaire Marie-Andree Leclerc."

She also worked for The Canadian Press, Chatelaine and many other publications and broadcast outlets in Canada and around the world.

She was predeceased by her partner Keiichiro Murata and moved to Montreal not long after his death.

Huguette was 72.

Georges Baumgartner
FCCJ President

Darryl GibsonF
CCJ Regular Member

Memorial Night

18:30-20:30 February 16, 2012

To commemorate the recent passing of a number of Club members, please join us on Feb. 16 to remember and toast our departed fiends. Members planning to attend are kindly asked to inform the reception desk (03-3211-3161) so that staff can make the appropriate preparations.

Atsuko Kobayashi DeRoy, a FCCJ Life member and a current Swadesh DeRoy Scholarship Committee member, passed away on November 8, 2011 at home in Gunma Prefecture. She has joined her husband, Swadesh, a former president of the FCCJ and principal advocate of our scholarship program who passed away in 2001. She was a pillar of support for the Scholarship Committee as well as other Club activities, including events for the Women's Activities Committee. She was 69.

Robert M. Immerman, an active former FCCJ associate member, passed away on July 22, 2011 while on a family visit in California. He was 79. He served at the US Embassy in Tokyo for three terms since the 1960s, later becoming a member of the US delegation to the United Nations, and then a visiting scholar in Japanese Studies and Administration at Columbia University, Weatherhead Institute for East Asian Studies, in New York.

Albert E. Kaff, of Fairfield, Connecticut, USA, retired foreign correspondent and vice-president of UPI, and a former active member and President of FCCJ, passed away on October 25, 2011, at St. Vincent's Medical Center, in Bridgeport, Connecticut, USA. He is survived by his wife Diana, two sons and four grandchildren. Albert Kaff was active in the FCCJ in the 1960's and early 1970's. He was 91.

Yasuo Kurata, a FCCJ Regular member, passed away November 18, 2011. He was a former foreign correspondent for Kyodo News and had been a member of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan since the mid-1960s. He passed away for acute ischemic heart disease on Nov. 18, according to his family. He was 87.

Huguette Laprise passed away on Aug. 30 last year at La Maison Notre-Dame du Saguenay, Quebec. She was a long-time club member, first as a foreign correspondent with La Presse, then as attaché at the Quebec Delegation in Tokyo and later as an editor with Kyodo News. She was 72.

Georges Baumgartner
FCCJ President

Organized by Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
In coordination with The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan (FCCJ)

The 4th Japan-Baltic Seminar
"The Baltic States and Japan through media"

13:30-17:00, Wednesday, December 14, 2011
FCCJ Dining Room

The year 2011 marks the 20th Anniversary of the establishment of New Diplomatic Relations between Japan and the Baltic States.
In 1990, the Baltic States proclaimed its independence. History shows that the media has played an important role in the movements for democracy, as seen in the case for the Baltic States, and also in the Arab Spring. Therefore, as the closing event for this memorial year, the 4th Japan-Baltic Seminar invites journalists from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. They will explain the situation of journalism in their countries and their views on the world.

Please see links below for your reference.

English
http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/europe/baltic_seminer1112.html

Japanese
http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/area/europe/baltics_sem/4th/index.html

We welcome your active participation in the Seminar.

The Seminar is open to the public and welcomes people of any and every backgrounds. For those who are interested, please register your participation no later than Monday, December 12 via Fax (03-3507-9771) or E-mail (s-oba@amok.co.jp) under the title "Japan-Baltic Seminar application" with necessary information (Your Name, Title/Position, Organization, Address, Telephone, Fax and E-mail.) It's free of charge.

Georges Baumgartner
FCCJ President

A revision of our Articles of Association will be discussed.

To All Regular Members:

This is to follow up the General Membership Meeting notice which I issued on Nov. 28. The GMM will be held on December 12. Please read it and attend the meeting.

As included in the agenda, we are to discuss a very important issue of revising our Articles of Association, in connection with obtaining a new status under the Shadan Hojin Law.

The Shadan Hojin Panel, which has studied this issue thoroughly, will explain to the general membership on major issues concerning the revision and invite you to express your views, especially in the areas related to the Club's governance.

Under the new law, we will have to a new governance structure that satisfies new legal requirements.

This will be conducted like a brain-storming session, and no resolution will adopted on any specific clauses. But in the end, we hope to obtain some consensus of the general membership on the direction the Club should be heading for under the new law.

Based on what is discussed at the GMM, the Panel will finalize its draft for presentation to the Board. And after the Board reviews the draft and makes modifications, if needed, it will be discussed at a special general meeting we plan to hold in January.

This is a very important issue, so that I would like to have as large attendance as possible at the December GMM. And I look forward to seeing many of you there.

Sincerely,

Georges Baumgartner
FCCJ President

Obituary

With deep regret I would like to inform FCCJ members that Yasuo Kurata, a FCCJ Regular member, passed away November 18.

Yasuo Kurata, a former foreign correspondent for Kyodo News who had been a member of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan since the mid-1960s, died of acute ischemic heart disease on Nov. 18, his family said. He was 87.

After studying economics at Keio University, Kurata worked at Jiji Press, Reuters and UP (later UPI) and later went to the United States as a Fulbrighter in 1952.

He joined Kyodo News in 1953 and was stationed in London (at Reuters) in 1959-1963 and in Paris from 1970-1973.

He worked as a senior writer for Kyodo News and later became a freelance journalist and newscaster for Radio Tampa. He also frequently appeared in public broadcaster NHK's commentary program.

A prolific writer, Kurata wrote many books including "Japone to France", "Yalta Kaidan (Conference)", "Napoleon Mystery" and "Eiffel Tower Mystery" and was a regular contributor to the Shinano Mainichi Shimbun in Nagano and other publications.

He also served as a member of the Board of Trustees at the JAL Foundation.

A wake is scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 26, at 6 p.m. and a funeral service for Sunday, Nov. 27, at 10 a.m., both at Rakan Kaikan in Tokyo's Meguro Ward.

Georges Baumgartner
FCCJ President

Shiro Yoneyama
FCCJ Regular Member