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May 05, 2024
 

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Leonid Bershidsky
For Leonid Bershidsky's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 25, 2022
Putin's invasion of Ukraine is a sin all Russia will bear
It is not Putin who is cursed now — it's all of us Russians. Our identity will be tainted by this invasion, by our failure to stop the dictator long before he crossed this unspeakable line.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 23, 2022
Russia and the specter of a permanent Ukraine crisis
The relatively small step Putin took is not a sign of weakness nor the end of the Ukraine crisis. It's the strongest move he could have made in the conspiratorial, hostile world he inhabits.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 5, 2021
Putin needs a real casus belli to invade Ukraine
It would be reasonable to assume that Putin is weighing some kind of sudden onslaught scenario in case his 'red line” in relation to Ukraine is crossed.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 17, 2021
Why Putin’s money eludes offshore investigators
Only three Russians made the ICIJ's list of 50 'power players,” deemed by the investigators to be the Pandora Papers' most prominent persons in the eyes of the international audience.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 21, 2021
We’re being watched. So are our watchers.
In modern society, the legal concept of a reasonable expectation of privacy is increasingly meaningless.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 11, 2021
Russia has been the Sputnik vaccine’s worst enemy
Now that a peer-reviewed article in The Lancet has established Sputnik as safe and effective, the initial failure of many countries to believe in it looks like a missed opportunity.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 25, 2021
Navalny vs. Putin is an epic and existential battle
Russians appreciate and respect power plays. Both Navalny and Putin know it. And for both, a lot is at stake.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 18, 2021
Tech censorship is the real gift to Putin
Authoritarians these days have to pay lip service to freedom of speech; what the social media platforms have done takes that concern out of the equation.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 28, 2020
Age discrimination is bad for business
Not acting forcefully on ageism will increasingly carry a heavy cost for politicians.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 19, 2020
Putin's new plan to hold power forever
The Russian leader has come up with a constitutional reform that gives him three paths to indefinite rule.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 14, 2020
Iran admits to plane shootdown, but Russia still won't
Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of Russia's overseas propaganda channel, RT, had a telling reaction to Iran's admission that its Revolutionary Guards Corps had accidentally shot down a Ukrainian civilian airliner last week.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 13, 2020
Putin's latest obsession: Rewriting World War II
Russia's leader believes the narrative is shifting in ways that make the Soviet Union a villain.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 8, 2020
Putin now needs a Plan B on Iran
Soleimani's death may force a change in the calculus involving Syria, Iran and Turkey.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 25, 2019
The British monarchy needs to get serious about brand management
Sweden's experience shows that smaller and cheaper reigning houses are better investments.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 4, 2019
Germany's windmills are wildly unpopular
In renewable energy, competition from fossil fuels isn't the only problem: Local politics may be an even higher hurdle.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 25, 2019
Russia-Turkey deal poses challenge to West
The Kremlin offers authoritarians a brokerage service based on cynical principles of mutual gain rather than values and allegiances.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 8, 2019
Putin's Russia is now a Middle Eastern country
The Eurasia giant has found its place among the oil dictatorships.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 30, 2019
How Thomas Cook's 'excursions' lost their way
The 19th century concept of holiday travel is beginning to come apart.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 21, 2019
Vinyl, books and magazines will never go away
Supposedly outdated content formats like LPs and print allow consumers — and marketers — to go beyond the masses.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 18, 2019
Putin's trolling of Trump isn't just about missiles
Russia's offer to sell air defense systems to Saudi Arabia is really a bid to replace the U.S. as the region's go-to problem solver.
Japan says Biden's description of nation as xenophobic is 'unfortunate'
The National Diet building in Tokyo
With eye on China, defense chiefs agree to bolster interoperability
From left: U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Australian defense chief Richard Marles, Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara and Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro hold a joint news conference in Honolulu on Thursday.
The 'outsiders' creating some of Japan's greenest spaces
Rows of irises resemble a rice field at the Peter Walker-designed Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.
Japan drops to 70th in press freedom rankings
A businessman reads a newspaper outside a train station in Tokyo.
Traders spooked by intervention risk trim record yen shorts
Traders edged back from record bets on yen weakness this past week, in a period that included a likely bout of intervention by Japan to prop up the currency.
Kishida sets sights on energy and climate in South America trip
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will use a policy speech in Sao Paulo to set out his vision for ties between Japan and South America, almost 10 years after former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe advocated for stronger ties between the two in the same city.
Yellow sand allergy: A health issue made worse by climate change
A screenshot of the Meteorological Agency's satellite image of clouds and yellow sand (in pink) on Sunday.
Climate change, chalky grains and the risks for Japan’s rice farmers
A farmer plants seedlings in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture. Japan’s self sufficiency rate for rice is nearly 100%, compared with 38% for food overall, on a calorie basis.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.

Podcast

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[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Longform

Rows of irises resemble a rice field at the Peter Walker-designed Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.
The 'outsiders' creating some of Japan's greenest spaces
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