AP A car bomb exploded outside a mosque Sunday, killing at least 37 people and wounding another 141 in a mostly Shiite Muslim neighborhood in the southern Pakistan city of Karachi — the third mass-casualty attack on the minority sect in the country this ...
It's a dangerous, unpredictable world. Twice in January Chinese warships in the East China Sea challenged Japan's Maritime Self Defense Forces patrols in a manner deemed threatening. And on Feb. 12 came North Korea's nuclear test.
Here's an open secret: Japanese men have a bad international reputation on the romance front.
SELLING WOMEN: Prostitution, Markets and the Household in Early Modern Japan, by Amy Stanley. University of California Press, 2012, 282 pp., $49.95 (hardcover) In the vast cultural landscape, Japan fascinates the mainstream with manga and anime, the martial arts, Zen and kimono. Of course, ...
Kenta Maeda shook off worries about his form with five shutout innings as Japan beat China 5-2 in first-round Pool A of the World Baseball Classic on Sunday at Fukuoka Dome. Japan improved to 2-0 following a tough win over Brazil in Saturday evening’s ...
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Japan won't have to vow to scrap all trade tariffs if it joins the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade pact, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and U.S. President Barack Obama confirm.
U.S. groups lobbying for the return of children abducted by a parent across international borders react with skepticism to Japan's plan to ratify the Hague Convention.
Japan's informal army of young, hyper-nationalist Web users puts U.S. citizen Miki Dezaki in its cross hairs for uploading a video titled "Racism in Japan" on YouTube.
Asian Development Bank President Haruhiko Kuroda becomes a strong contender to succeed Masaaki Shirakawa as governor of the Bank of Japan.
Ailing Japanese electronics maker Sharp Corp. will cut off stalled capital tieup talks with Taiwanese business partner Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and give priority to capital alliance negotiations with another firm.
The International Atomic Energy Agency plans to propose a multinational mission to decommission the Fukushima No. 1 plant's wrecked nuclear reactors, a challenge that will take decades.
Experts under the Nuclear Regulation Authority conditionally approves the trial of a new device to remove radioactive substances from tainted water at the Fukushima No. 1 complex.
Tokyo and Beijing agree to promote technical cooperation and to explore further measures for dealing with the dangerous air pollution levels in and coming from China.
The World Trade Organization is calling on Japan to make bold structural reforms while offering broad support for its current money-easing policies. “Members felt that the accommodative macroeconomic policies being pursued, particularly by the new government, can help Japan to recover from the recent ...
Recent concerns about competitive currency devaluations are “overstated,” according to the International Monetary Fund. The yen’s recent sharp fall has sparked concerns about competitive devaluations, the IMF said Thursday in a report on global prospects and policy challenges. “Taking a broader perspective, however, such ...
Hollywood action star and former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger met Friday with Environment Minister Nobuteru Ishihara to discuss global warming and energy matters. Ishihara said he and Schwarzenegger exchanged views on issues such as nuclear power and the impact of coal-fired power generation on ...
Court appointed lawyers acting as prosecutors filed an appeal Friday against a ruling earlier this week that dismissed the indictment of a former senior police officer over a 2001 human crush on a pedestrian bridge that resulted in 11 deaths in Akashi, Hyogo Prefecture. ...
Members of a nonpartisan legislator group seeking to abolish the death penalty lodged a protest Friday with Justice Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki over Thursday’s execution of three death-row inmates. Shizuka Kamei, who heads the group, urged Tanigaki to proactively inform the public about the global ...
Hewlett-Packard, the troubled but biggest maker of personal computers, promised “disruptive innovations” Thursday after seeing its profit slip in the past quarter. HP said its net profit for its first fiscal quarter declined 16 percent from the same period a year ago to $1.2 ...
NASA says its Curiosity rover has scooped up a sample from the interior of a Martian rock and found that the powdery soil just beneath the planet's rust-colored exterior is actually a light gray color.
Akiko Kuno, 72, believes her destiny is tied with a red string to the United States. So she says as she speaks of her and her family’s life at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan in Tokyo, where as a child she first tasted ...
Sanfrecce Hiroshima manager Hajime Moriyasu urges his team to forget last year’s historic J. League title triumph and start afresh in Saturday’s 2013 season curtain-raising Xerox Super Cup match against Kashiwa Reysol.
When forensic psychiatrist Frank Farnham first meets a stalker, he doesn't judge. Some of his clients have done awful things. They have intimidated, pursued and terrified their victims.
The muted light of an African sunset filters into the high, pointed roof of Christ The King church in Accra, a wide, understated building just metres away from the seat of government in Ghana's capital city.
Foreigners can take a Japanese calligraphy lesson March 9 in Toyonaka, Osaka Prefecture . Translation service in English will be provided during the lesson, which will run from 10 a.m. to noon. Participation is free. Reservations must be made by March 5 by sending ...
Japan’s economic troubles may be pushing the country toward free-trade negotiations with the United States, a goal long-sought by officials in Washington who see it as a potential boon.
Three former students who were involved in making paper balloon bombs at a Nagoya school during the war saw and touched the “washi” (traditional Japanese paper) used to make the balloons for the first time in 68 years on Feb. 16. The paper used ...
A 21-year-old Canadian tourist’s body has been founded wedged in a water tank atop a downtown Los Angeles hotel, authorities said Thursday, and more testing must be done to determine the cause of death. An autopsy performed the same day didn’t provide definitive answers ...
Two years after an earthquake devastated New Zealand’s second-largest city, killing 185 and rattling Phil Thompson’s suburban house off its foundations, the 65-year-old retiree still lives in a cramped trailer home parked on the incongruously neat lawn in front of his twisted wooden bungalow. ...
Next to my house lies a carpet of land not flat enough to resist puddles and not sandy enough to attract cats. It just sits there. Empty. “Symbolic,” says a friend, “of the hole in your life.” He means the car I do not ...
What is the next logical toilet model for Toto? After one has invented a toilet that welcomes you by lifting it’s lid automatically when you walk into the bathroom, cuddles you with a heated toilet seat, washes and dries your bum after you’ve done ...
A swaggering Chicago-area police officer whose sensational story inspired a TV movie starring Rob Lowe was sentenced to 38 years in prison Thursday for murdering his wife. Drew Peterson, 59, had divorced Kathleen Savio, his third wife, a year before her death in 2004 ...
When Kevin Mandia, a retired military cybercrime investigator, decided to expose China as a primary threat to U.S. computer networks, he did not have to consult with American diplomats in Beijing or declassify tactics to safely reveal government secrets. He pulled together a 76-page ...
They were very ordinary would-be terrorists, with big plans but bad luck. On Thursday, a London jury convicted the three young British men of being ringleaders of an al-Qaida-inspired plot to explode knapsack bombs in crowded parts of Birmingham, England’s second-largest city. The men ...
Golden State sends former Tokyo Apache forward Jeremy Tyler to the Atlanta Hawks in a move to cut salary.
The ¥1.48 billion that the Tokyo Metropolitan Government collected in donations to buy and maintain the Senkakus is just lying idle, waiting to be used, after the central government nipped in to snag the disputed islets in September. Money began pouring from last April ...
Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. President Andrew House anticipates a strong launch of the newly unveiled PlayStation 4, the first overhaul of the iconic gaming device since 2006. “This has been a lot longer life cycle than we have previously seen,” House said Thursday. “There ...
With Friday the day that Japan commemorates incorporating Takeshima, a group of rocky Sea of Japan islets now controlled by South Korea, the aging residents of nearby islands have not given up hope that the disputed outcroppings may one day be returned to Japan.
The Liberal Democratic Party-led government appears reluctant to disclose the criteria under which it chose to execute three men Thursday, the first hangings since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe took power in December. Some observers speculate that two of them were picked out of the ...
President Barack Obama won’t back off demands that Japan ease barriers for U.S. automakers before joining negotiations for a regional Pacific trade agreement when he meets Friday in Washington with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, White House aides said. A more open market for companies ...
Taiwan’s National Palace Museum and the Tokyo National Museum are selecting 200 Chinese antiquities for exhibitions in Tokyo and Fukuoka in 2014. The exhibitions will be held at the Tokyo National Museum for 12 weeks from June to September 2014 and eight weeks at ...
The Liberal Democratic Party has rejected a proposal by Kokumin Shinto (People’s New Party) to merge and instead is demanding that the three-man opposition force disband and the lawmakers be considered individually for membership in the ruling party. LDP Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba said ...
A human rights group urged the government Friday to start talks on how to compensate victims of Japan’s wartime sex slavery in East Timor, an initiative that comes just days after the 71st anniversary Wednesday of the Imperial army’s invasion of the then-Portuguese colony. ...
A fuel leak in a Japan Airlines 787 during maintenance work at Narita International Airport was due to a malfunction in the valve of a fuel pipe caused by flaws in coating, the transport ministry said Friday. About 100 liters of jet fuel leaked ...
The first official Hello Kitty shop in Austria opened Thursday in a shopping mall in Vienna. Sanrio Co.’s Hello Kitty brand is popular in Europe, and shop manager Thomas Gottsbacher said “there are even people from Germany coming all the way here” to buy ...
A senior government official Friday attended the annual ceremony commemorating the day Takeshima, now controlled by South Korea, was incorporated as Japanese territory, sparking a protest from Seoul. The presence of Aiko Shimajiri, a parliamentary secretary with the Cabinet Office, at the Takeshima Day ...
Indian police revealed Friday they had been warned of a possible attack by Islamist militants in a bustling shopping area of Hyderabad where twin bombings killed at least 14 people and wounded scores. The nearly simultaneous attacks on Thursday night outside a movie theater ...
Scientists have identified brain chemicals that allow seals to sleep with half of their brain at a time, according to a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience. And they say that the discovery of how what they called a “unique biological phenomenon” works ...
In the hunt for ways to extend life, scientists are turning to an unlikely source: the gas that gives rotten eggs their foul smell. Hydrogen sulfide — maligned for its toxic and explosive properties — may slow aging and block damaging chemical reactions inside ...
Polish language experts launched a campaign Thursday to preserve the challenging system of its diacritical marks, saying the tails, dots and strokes are becoming obsolete under the pressure of IT and speed. The drive, initiated by the state-run Council of the Polish Language, is ...
South African police appointed a new chief investigator Thursday in the Oscar Pistorius murder case, replacing a veteran detective after revelations that the officer was charged with seven counts of attempted murder. The sensational twist in the state’s troubled investigation fueled growing public fascination ...
The world may have tired of the civil war in Sudan’s Darfur region, but for Fatima there is no escape from its painful legacy a decade after fighting began. “I remember the day my village was burned by Janjaweed and they killed my husband ...
An Air India pilot faces the wrath of his bosses after appearing in a YouTube video rapping about bad pay, aging female flight attendants and canceled flights. Titled “Air India Rap,” the homemade track starts with the pilot putting on his uniform before the ...
Small, volcanic, with a proud Viking heritage and run by an openly gay prime minister, Iceland is now considering becoming the first democracy in the Western world to try to ban online pornography. A nationwide consultation has found wide support for the move from ...
Richard III may have had an ignominious resting place under a car park in Leicester, in England’s East Midlands, but spare a thought for Henri IV. First the French monarch was disinterred from the royal sepulchre by revolutionaries and thrown into a mass grave. ...
The growing global demand for quinoa by health food enthusiasts isn’t just raising prices for the Andean “supergrain” and living standards among Bolivian farmers — quinoa fever is running up against physical limits. The scramble to grow more of the crop is prompting Bolivian ...
It’s just after morning opening at Sydney’s Randwick Labor Club and already a few regulars are at the slot machines, or “pokies” as they are known locally, for a quiet flutter. Electronic poker machines are the most popular form of betting in Australia, but ...
In another mark of the increasingly digital life of teenagers, more than 25 percent of those who dated said their love interests threatened or harassed them online or using texts, according to a new study that is touted as the most comprehensive look at ...
Newly crowned overall ski jumping World Cup champion Sara Takanashi will aim for her first gold medal at the FIS World Nordic Ski Championships on Friday. In an official practice on Thursday, the 16-year-old phenom had a leap of 101 meters to move into ...
A Swedish court Thursday overturned the rape conviction of a man who performed a forced “infidelity check” on his girlfriend, prompting calls for the country’s rape laws to be changed. Rachid Zoghlami was convicted of rape and sentenced to two years and eight months ...
The snow is gone from the Match Play Championship, and so are Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods. In a stunning conclusion to what already is a bizarre week on Dove Mountain, Shane Lowry of Ireland made a 4-foot par putt on the 18th hole ...
Kei Nishikori defeated American Donald Young in straight sets to advance to the quarterfinals of the U.S. National Indoor Tennis Championships on Thursday. Fifth-seeded Nishikori, who is playing in his first tournament since reaching the last 16 of the Australian Open in January, won ...
The average monthly wage of full-time female workers rose 0.5 percent to ¥233,100 last year, the highest level since records began to be kept in 1976, the health ministry announced. The latest survey covered wage levels last June at around 49,000 business establishments, excluding ...
New York Yankees outfielders Curtis Granderson and Brett Gardner could be switching positions. Granderson worked out in left field Thursday and the speedy Gardner switched to center. “I think it has a chance to help us a little bit, but I’m not really sure,” ...
Brazilian legend Pele is preparing to start limiting his professional schedule of engagements as the 72-year-old gets over hip replacement surgery, O Estado de Sao Paulo daily reported on Thursday. Pele has spent as much as six months a year on commercial activities but ...
Higher than normal levels of toxic smog spreading to Japan from China were observed at 48 of 155 observatories nationwide, or 31 percent of the total, on Jan. 31, the National Institute for Environmental Studies said. The 48 observatories with higher levels of so-called ...
When you’re hot, you’re hot. Saitama Broncos guard Yuki Kitamuki drained 8 of 12 3-pointers en route to a game-best 30 points and dished out nine assists in an 89-84 victory over the Sendai 89ers on Friday, and Saitama completed a two-game sweep. John ...
The Tokyo Marathon will make its debut as a World Marathon Majors race Sunday with a potential race record in store in the men’s competition. Tokyo joins Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago and New York in the six-legged series contested over a two-year period. The ...
James van Riemsdyk kept the Buffalo Sabres reeling on Thursday night. Van Riemsdyk scored twice to power the Toronto Maple Leafs past the Buffalo Sabres 3-1 in Ron Rolston’s first game as an NHL head coach. Rolston, who until Wednesday was the head coach ...
Shareholders of struggling chip-maker Renesas Electronics Corp. approved Friday a ¥150 billion investment plan from a government-backed fund and eight companies to accelerate restructuring steps. Renesas, which commands 40 percent of the global market for automobile microcontrollers, aims to improve its financial standing and ...
Police sent papers to prosecutors on Friday, charging new Chunichi Dragons infielder Matt Clark of possibly violating stimulant control laws after an illegal stimulant was detected in medication he had been using to treat a chronic illness. Clark, 26, is accused of possession and ...
The winning bidder of a teacup used by pop icon Lady Gaga died Thursday of an illness, a day after donating it to Miyagi Prefecture, his sister said. Akihisa Yumi, a 54-year-old dentist in the Miyagi city of Osaki, bought the teacup for around ...
Serena Williams, the world No. 1, and Victoria Azarenka, the only unbeaten leading player on the women’s tour this year, have been penalized for their late withdrawals from the Dubai Championships. Williams, who had a bad back and withdrew on Wednesday, has had $50,000 ...
Japan’s regenerative medicine market will total ¥1.6 trillion in 2030, up from ¥26 billion in 2012, with products made from human cells increasing in variety and the commercialization of those from artificially derived multipurpose stem cells, the industry ministry forecast Friday. The Ministry of ...
A French author has written in graphic detail about her eight-month affair with disgraced former International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn, calling the relationship “field work” for a controversial new book. The book by Argentina-born Marcela Iacub, a columnist with the leftwing ...
Former Wimbledon champ Petra Kvitova overpowered defending champion Agnieszka Radwanska 6-2, 6-4 on Thursday to set up a semifinal against Caroline Wozniacki in the Dubai Championships. Wozniacki, once ranked No. 1, defeated Marion Bartoli 4-6, 6-1, 6-4, capitalizing on 14 double-faults and 46 unforced ...
The case for the prosecution is now stronger than that put by the defense. The English media have been reluctant to criticize Arsene Wenger because no manager has been more helpful during the 16 years he has been in charge at Arsenal, yet as ...
Munich is the first applicant to the German Football Federation to be the country’s host city for the 2020 European Championship. Bayern Munich chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge says Munich is bidding to host the final and semifinals, as well as three group games and a ...
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is going ahead with a plan to put heart defibrillators in hockey arenas across Canada. Harper was at a rink in Saskatoon on Thursday when he announced details of the four-year initiative that begins with assessing the needs of 3,000 ...
