But does Sir Ian think he got a fair treatment with hacks raking over the Six Continents past - albeit all fairly recent stuff - to highlight apparent shortcomings?"I think there is always a problem when you have to write something under a time pressure. Sainsbury's is not getting a chairman who easily subscribes to the vagaries of the latest management style or business school orthodoxy. He has a style described as "autocratic" and "theoretical" and his long brewing association leads him to being classed as a member of Britian's "beerage", the upper class dynasties, which traditionally controlled the country's brewing industry."There are not many of that sort of person who went to Watford Grammar School," said Sir Ian yesterday, reflecting on a bruising week.Sainsbury's City advisers had to busy themselves last week smoothing shareholders' ruffled feathers and Sir Ian himself is planning a charm offensive to meet shareholders probably before he joins in March. The Bass that Sir Ian inherited in 1987 has been split asunder, although regulatory edicts in the past forcing him to sell tenanted pubs and blocking a brewing merger with Carlsberg-Tetley did not help.But some of the brouhaha surrounding Sir Ian is not simply about business It has a more personal motive. A year ago, the new chairman-elect of J Sainsbury stood accused of "ripping the heart" out of the Six Continents hotels and pubs group, which he joined in 1969 after answering a national newspaper advertisement when the company was still called Bass.

Anger and passion seem to follow Sir Ian Prosser around in equal measure. He ended up holding absolute power at the group as joint chairman and chief executive. In the 1980s it tried to take the sting out of the raw deal for women on Valentine's Day by creating White Day on 14 March, obliging men to return the favour.But it never really caught on in the same way as 14 February, partly because the custom of giving chocolate to men in Japan is underpinned by complex - and unequal - social relations. Increasingly, White Day has become an afterthought to the main event and few men take it seriously.Many women have tried more direct forms of protest against the custom. Keiko Shimura, a housewife who temps at a construction company in Tokyo, refuses to buy anything for "any man I don't like" but admits it is difficult to say no to an office collection. She said: "You're made to feel guilty or selfish but I don't care The whole thing is just so hypocritical. The women who do it don't even like the men they're buying chocolate for."Come the day, most women will compromise, holding their noses while putting their money in the office kitty, and thinking of the stash of chocolate they will pick up on the way home..

The phenomenon of the single young woman shopping for designer chocolates has even been featured on national television.Commentators are divided on whether the trend is a healthy sign of female self-assertiveness or further confirmation that Japan's younger generation is becoming increasingly selfish.But vox pops seem to have had little problem finding women such as Yuko Tamura who said: "It's my money, so why shouldn't I spend it on myself."The chocolate industry has been here before. Printemps Ginza, one of the department stores that sells the abundance of chocolate consumed in the first two weeks of February, reports that 82 per cent of women will buy chocolates for themselves. "He shouts at me all year and on the one day set aside for love I have to reward him with a present," she says. "It's not fair."Ms Fujita's resentment is shared by thousands of women who have for years endured a unique Japanese spin on 14 February that would have St Valentine turning in his grave. Supporters of the ousted regime of Saddam Hussein and foreign fighters are thought to be leading the insurgency..

It's a tradition that is supposed to promote love and romance, but for Junko Fujita it just makes her sick. Abizaid was unharmed.In that attack, the gunmen opened fire with RPGs and automatic weapons from rooftops after Abizaid's convoy pulled into the walled compound Abizaid escaped unharmed, and there were no US injuries. Iraqi police reported that two Iraqis were killed.Fallujah, 36 miles west of Baghdad, lies in the so-called Sunni Triangle, the heartland of the guerrilla campaign against the US-led occupation. The two buildings are about half a mile apart.In the gun battle that ensued, Iraqi security forces took cover under a hail of gunfire. A petrol bomb burned in the street and a rocket propelled grenade could be heard whizzing by.Abdul Hamid al-Janabi, a security official at Fallujah hospital, said at least 18 police and civilians were killed, along with two attackers.Of the 30 wounded, most were policemen, though two women and a child were among the injured, al-Janabi said. Two wounded attackers taken to the hospital were arrested, he said."Ambulances are still bringing more people," al-Janabi said.The attack came two days after insurgents carried out a bold attack against an Iraqi security forces base in Fallujah just as the top US commander in the Middle East, General John Abizaid, was visiting. A gun battle followed an attack on a police station and a government building in Iraq today, reportedly leaving up to 20 people dead. The attackers, riding in vehicles, opened fire on the buildings in Fallujah with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades, said police officer Essam Yaseen.The wounded included five policemen and three civilians, he said.