To Mr. Hashimoto, the Tokyo cafe was an extension of his living room, where he had once kept the memorabilia. He allowed in only his former industry colleagues and their friends, ...

Former Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, 68, who stood up to the United States in trade negotiations and helped diffuse tensions over U.S. military bases in Japan, died of multiple organ ...

But Mr Hashimoto was not the lone wolf, or the new broom, he sometimes seemed. The sponsorship of two former prime ministers, Kakuei Tanaka and Yasuhiro Nakasone, helped him along.

Mr. Hashimoto next worked with Kurosawa on “Seven Samurai,” a 3 ½ -hour epic about a group of unemployed samurai who are recruited to defend a village from bandits.

Former Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, who stood up to the United States in trade negotiations and helped defuse tensions over U.S. military bases in Japan, has died. He was 68 ...

Which is why my first impulse, upon greeting Mr. Naohisa Hashimoto, is to turn around, in the most diplomatic possible way, of course, and run screaming back to my hotel.

Mr Hashimoto created the code back in 1986 when he was playing a shooting game called Gradius. "I hadn't played that much and obviously couldn't beat it myself, so I put in the Konami code," he ...