National
Researchers hurt at Ibaraki nuclear facility
Up to 30 researchers are feared to have suffered internal radiation exposure after an experiment went awry at a Japan Atomic Energy Agency facility.
Commentary Jan 30, 2012
U.S. claims to be pushing reform of U.N. bodies, but campaign smacks of intrigue, shady politics
by Ramzy Baroud
The country that has long been known to abuse its powers and privileges in the United Nations is now leading a campaign to reform the same organization. While U.N. reforms are welcomed, if not demanded, by many of its member states, there is little ...
Commentary Jan 25, 2012
China's limits as a role model
by Frank Ching
Forty years ago, the arch-conservative American President Richard M. Nixon shocked his country and the world by visiting communist China, a country that the United States did not recognize and whose soldiers had fought American soldiers in the Korean war. Last week, that historic ...
Editorial Jan 21, 2012
Bolstering Japan-India ties
Compared with its long historical and cultural ties and deep economic relations with China, Japan’s relations with India are not so strong. But the economic and strategic importance of the world’s largest democracy to Japan is growing fast. Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s visit to ...
Editorial Jan 16, 2012
Russia as a WTO member
A ministerial conference of the World Trade Organization in mid-December unanimously approved Russia’s request to join the world trade body. It also approved Samoa’s and Montenegro’s entry. It took 18 years for Russia to become a WTO member. This is the first time since ...
Global-related Jan 11, 2012
Does promise or peril await in North Korea?
by Javier Solana
Two days after Kim Jong Il, North Korea’s leader, died in a train in his country, South Korean authorities still knew nothing about it. Meanwhile, American officials seemed at a loss, with the State Department at first merely acknowledging that press reports had mentioned ...
Global-related Dec 18, 2010
WikiLeaks' flawed answer to a flawed world
by Esther Dyson
NEW YORK — Long ago, I wrote about the Internet pioneer Julf Helsingius, who ran a precursor to WikiLeaks called anon.penet.fi. As I said then: “Anonymity in itself should not be illegal. There are enough good reasons for people to be anonymous that it ...
Global-related Dec 16, 2010
Is open diplomacy possible or even desirable?
by Peter Singer
PRINCETON, New Jersey — When the furor erupted over WikiLeaks’ recent release of a quarter-million diplomatic cables, I was reminded of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s 1918 speech in which he put forward “Fourteen Points” for a just peace to end World War I. The ...
Global-related Dec 6, 2010
India moving to pole position for Security Council challenge
by Harsh V. Pant
LONDON — U.S. President Barack Obama made a splash in India recently when he indicated that the United States would back India’s bid for a permanent seat on an expanded United Nations Security Council. It was a major policy shift that India has long ...
Global-related Dec 3, 2010
North Korea evokes pity and condemnation
by John J. Metzler
UNITED NATIONS — Amid severe food shortages affecting up to a quarter of the population, horrific human rights abuses, and an expanding and costly nuclear weapons program, the United Nations has tried to respond to North Korea with a combination of carrots and sticks. ...
Commentary Nov 25, 2010
Surviving the currency competition
by Shinji Fukukawa
The yen’s exchange value is considered likely to top the rate of ¥79.75 to the dollar registered in 1995 for an all-time high sooner or later. At a meeting that ended Oct. 23, Group of 20 finance ministers and central bank governors managed to ...