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August 24, 2025
 

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COMMENTARY
Oct 31, 2010
The West's Mideast obsession
By Gwynne Dyer
LONDON — The media in the Middle East carry a lot of Middle Eastern stories, of course, but why do most of the other media in the world do the same?
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Oct 31, 2010
Why does distance ameliorate a war crime?
By Hiroaki Sato
NEW YORK — One aspect of the modern sense of war, be it delusional, duplicitous or both, was palpable in two articles paired at the top of the front page of The New York Times toward the end of September. The headline of one said "Drug Use Cited In Killings of 3 Civilians"; the headline of the other,...
COMMENTARY
Oct 30, 2010
A diet for Britain's defense
By Hugh Cortazzi
One of the first acts of the British coalition government was the establishment of a National Security Council. Its primary task was to prepare a new strategic defense and security review. This was published on the day before the government announced its austerity program.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 29, 2010
ATM for the new gold rush
By Kevin Rafferty
HONG KONG — The 21st-century version of the Gold Rush is becoming so sophisticated and convenient that soon all you will have to do, if you live in the right place, is put your card in the normal slot of a special ATM machine, punch in your password, and out will tumble not boring paper currency but...
COMMENTARY
Oct 29, 2010
Joint projects would build Japan-China trust
By Frank Ching
HONG KONG — While the immediate crisis over Japan's seizure last month of a Chinese fishing vessel that rammed two Japanese coast guard patrol boats has ended with the release of the captain, the repercussions will long be felt.
COMMENTARY
Oct 28, 2010
Should the U.S. be worried as Latin America prospers?
By Gregory Clark
Behind the excitement in the rescue of the 33 Chilean miners buried 623 meters underground for 69 days lies a mystery.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 28, 2010
Talk to Taliban from a position of strength
By Richard Weitz
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has affirmed that, while it will not participate directly, it supports the idea of peace negotiations between the Afghan Taliban and the Afghan government. This nod from the White House followed the publication of reports that representatives of Afghan President...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 28, 2010
Big ideas are emerging from small countries
By Jeffrey Fankel
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Two decades ago, many people thought that the lesson of the 1980s was that Japan's variant of capitalism was the best model, and that other countries around the world should and would follow it. The Japanese model quickly lost its luster in the 1990s.
COMMENTARY
Oct 27, 2010
Brace for the race to put bases on the moon
By Gwynne Dyer
The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) has just released the full data on last year's mission to find out whether there are usable amounts of water on the moon, and the news is good. There is plenty of frozen water on the moon, plus frozen gases like methane, oxygen and hydrogen that would...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 27, 2010
China's fair-weather friends in Washington
By Hans-Werner Sinn
MUNICH — Because China has pegged its undervalued currency, the renminbi, to the dollar, every weakening of the dollar in the wake of America's financial crisis has also meant a weakening of the renminbi vis-a-vis other world currencies. But is China really to blame for the eruption of a global currency...
COMMENTARY
Oct 27, 2010
A British lesson for Japan?
By Hugh Cortazzi
The program of cuts to be made in the British budget over the years to the next election due in 2015 was outlined by Finance Minister George Osborne to Parliament on Oct. 20. The program envisages the elimination of the structural deficit by 2015 and the axing of just under half a million jobs in the...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 27, 2010
Building Greater Europe
By Fyodor Lukyanov
MOSCOW — Greater Europe is at a crossroads. Twenty years after the fall of the Iron Curtain, it remains divided, unable to unify into a global force. Each of the three parts of Greater Europe — Russia, the European Union and the countries between them — is in crisis. The causes and forms of these...
Japan to revise romanization rules for first time in 70 years
The Agency for Cultural Affairs is recommending replacing the government’s long-standing Kunrei system with more widely used Hepburn-style spellings.
Women-only communities flourish in China
Chen Yani (right), nicknamed "Keke," eats lunch with friends and guests in a female co-living space she founded called "Keke's Imaginative Space" in Hangzhou, in eastern China's Zhejiang province, on July 14.
JR East cancels luxury train run over crew's boozing
East Japan Railway said Thursday that it will cancel one trip of a luxury overnight sleeper service, which was originally scheduled to depart from Ueno Station in Tokyo on Aug. 30, after crew members were found to have been drinking alcohol on duty.
Man arrested over deadly stabbing of woman in Kobe
Masashi Tanimoto, 35, the suspect in the deadly stabbing a 24-year-old woman, is taken into custody in Kobe on Friday night.
Japanese city proposes two-hour daily limit for smartphone use
The Toyoake Municipal Government in Aichi Prefecture is planning to enact an ordinance to urge all smartphone users in the city to limit screen time to two hours a day outside work or school.
Alicia Keys closed Summer Sonic, but J-pop owned it
Summer Sonic’s 2025 lineup demonstrated its strength, showcasing the latest in J-pop, including “new kawaii” act Fruits Zipper.
Is the LDP’s catch-all approach to politics still effective?
Former economic security minister Sanae Takaichi visits Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo on Aug. 15. Political commentator Toru Hashimoto has suggested that Takaichi ought to lead a group of like-minded hawkish politicians out of the Liberal Democratic Party and form their own party.
Fingers sore from too much phone time? You might have ‘sumaho yubi.’
A catch-all term for tendonitis and arthritis caused by excessive smartphone use, 'sumaho yubi' may be difficult to treat for gadget-crazy Japan.
As farm minister, Koizumi is held ‘hostage’ by Ishiba
Farm minister Shinjiro Koizumi (center) attends a Lower House session on Aug. 1. Locking Koizumi into the Cabinet is Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s way of turning a potential rival into a team player, according to one expert.
Big burgers and bigger ambitions for Japan's Burger King
Kazuhiro Nomura, president of BK Japan Holdings, which operates Burger King in Japan

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past
By Alex K.T. Martin

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