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Japan minister launches counterattack after Ghosn blasts justice system

TOKYO — Japan's justice minister launched a rare and forceful public takedown of auto executive-turned-fugitive Carlos Ghosn after he blasted the country's legal system as allowing him "zero chance" of a fair trial as he sought to justify his escape to Beirut. After his dramatic flight to Lebanon last month, Ghosn spoke in public for the first time on Wednesday, saying he had been treated "brutally" by Tokyo prosecutors. He said they questioned him for up to eight hours a day without a lawyer present and tried to extract a confession out of him. In an effort to undo Ghosn's attempt to sway public opinion in his favor, Justice Minister Masako Mori followed shortly with a statement, translated into English and French, and held a news conference after midnight and again around 9:30 a.m. on Thursday morning to defend Japan's justice system. "I decided to do this because defendant Ghosn was looking to justify his unlawful exit from Japan by propagating a false recognition of our justice system," she said at the second news conference. "I felt that we needed to respond immediately to broadcast a correct understanding to people around the world." Ghosn, the former chief of Nissan and Renault, fled Japan last month as he was awaiting trial on charges of under-reporting earnings, breach of trust, and misappropriation of company funds, all of which he denies. Mori said Ghosn's escape from his trial in itself "could constitute a crime" that would not be tolerated in any country. "My impression in listening to him was that there were few statements that were backed by any real evidence," she said. "If he wants to prove his innocence, he should face fair trial proceedings here," she added, stressing that the allegations against him concerned financial crimes in Japan. "That would be the mark of a first-class businessperson and good citizen." Mori blasted Ghosn for violating his bail by fleeing the country "without showing a passport and breaking international rules that everyone in the world follows." "It was a breach of faith that can't be explained to our children," she said. The spotlight on Japan's justice system comes as Mori is set to host in April the United Nations' Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, held once every five years.

Nissan NV200 Chicago Taxi looking for a #HailYes

Nissan may be loaning out its small van to General Motors for its Chicago Auto Show debut, but that doesn't mean that Chevrolet is the only one with new NV200-based wares to share. On the heels of launching its Taxi Of Tomorrow for New York City, the Japanese automaker is giving America's Second City a livery of its own.
Shown here in a green and white paint scheme that "expresses a modern take on a historically popular Chicago taxi color," this NV200 Chicago Taxi is the company's less-than-subtle bid to capture some of the city's cab business, which is estimated to have about 7,000 units in service. Nissan is urging the public to generate discussion on social media and hopefully capture local taxi fleet operators' attention with a #HailYes campaign.
Beyond its unique appearance, this NV200 appears untouched, which means it's still powered by a 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine backed by a version of Nissan's ubiquitous XTronic continuously variable transmission.

Why China will soon lead the electric vehicle market

China could be the world's largest electric vehicle market by 2020, thanks to significant government subsidies and the major drawbacks of owning an internal combustion model there. The country's populace registered 75,000 EVs in 2014, and sales figures in 2015 looked even better. In a new video, Renault-Nissan examines the trend and why it happened. Chinese cities heavily encourage buyers to go green through vehicle incentives, but they also make it a hassle to be a polluter. In some places, there's a lottery to limit vehicle registrations and alternating driving bans for even or odd license plate numbers. However, these limits don't apply to EVs, and the country's automakers have benefited from the regulations by introducing small, inexpensive electric models, albeit with sometimes hilarious styling. China's emissions regulations will get even tighter in the coming years. In fact, a Honda exec recently predicted the company wouldn't be able to sell any models there without some form of electric assistance by 2025. Get a better look at the country's electric push to clean up vehicle pollution in Renault-Nissan's video. Related Video: