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August 06, 2025

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COMMENTARY

Jan 6, 2006

China eschews Soviet redux

By Robyn Lim

China's rapid-force modernization is driving strategic events in East Asia. But China is no longer communist; nor does it represent the same kind of threat posed by the USSR when it possessed huge military power and stretched across Eurasia, threatening U.S. allies at both ends. Thus important differences...

Japan Times

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 6, 2006

East Timor split by truth, justice and reconciliation

By Jeff Kingston

EAST TIMOR Swooping low over the azure Savu Sea, the pristine coastline and gnarly hills of Timor suddenly appear about two hours after takeoff from Bali. Before entering the spartan air terminal, visitors pass through a trailer where, upon arrival, $30 one-month visas are sold.

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 6, 2006

Jakarta can't spend a way to prosperity

By Christopher Lingle

UBUD, Indonesia -- Indonesia's chief economic minister, Boediono, along with Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati and Bank Indonesia Gov. Burhanuddin Abdullah are credible and competent bureaucrats. They put forth an action agenda of economic reforms designed to reinvigorate the local investment climate...

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 5, 2006

U.S.-China ideological rivalry heats up

By Eric Teo Chu Cheow

WASHINGTON -- Two recent events in Asia have again directly underscored the "ideological" tussle between Washington and Beijing, which is increasingly seen as a benevolent power and even as offering a model for socioeconomic development. As Asian leaders gathered last month in Kuala Lumpur for the East...

COMMENTARY

Jan 5, 2006

Deal harms Indian interests

By Brahma Chellaney

NEW DELHI -- A real problem of an ever-shifting goal post has cast a cloud over America's current negotiations with India to implement a much-heralded nuclear deal that is supposed to showcase the emerging global partnership between the world's most powerful and most populous democracies. Seeking to...

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 3, 2006

LDP landslide buries two-party system

By Jiro Yamaguchi

The result of the Sept. 11 general election was a runaway victory for the Liberal Democratic Party, and political chaos. But from the fog of uncertainty that is enveloping Japan there may emerge a new political structure that could some day be called the "2005 order."

COMMENTARY / World

Jan 3, 2006

Divisions, rivalries threaten new Cold War in East Asia

By Kang Sang Jung

What we have feared is threatening to become a reality. The open rivalry and discord between Japan and China is becoming the most destabilizing factor to the peace and prosperity of East Asia. The United States is so concerned by the mounting tensions between the two leading nations in the region that...

COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW

Jan 3, 2006

Putin 'exiles' the high court

By Constantine Pleshakov

MOSCOW -- Exiling someone is so very Russian. Although centuries passed by and regimes changed, authorities retained exile as a great tool of punishment and manipulation. Less objectionable than execution or imprisonment, it effectively uprooted and silenced the regimes' opponents -- and sometimes destroyed...

COMMENTARY

Jan 1, 2006

Beneficial potential of Singh's leadership

By Tom Plate

LOS ANGELES -- What will be the No. 1 geopolitical story in 2006? Don't be surprised if, by this time next year, India is the hot topic and Manmohan Singh, its prime minister, one of the world's most-watched leaders.

COMMENTARY

Jan 1, 2006

The year of Koizumi's exit

By Keizo Nabeshima

The year 2006 will mark a watershed for Japanese politics inasmuch as Junichiro Koizumi, who has ruled Japan for five years as one of the longest-serving prime ministers in the postwar era, insists that he will step down when his term as president of the governing Liberal Democratic Party expires.

COMMENTARY

Dec 31, 2005

Testing times for Japan, China

By Brad Glosserman

HONOLULU -- Taro Aso's recent comment in plain words about the "threat" posed by China's military modernization effort is as remarkable as the supposed threat itself. The readiness of a Japanese Cabinet official, and a foreign minister no less, to publicly acknowledge and criticize China's military buildup...

COMMENTARY

Dec 30, 2005

Decline of three EU leaders

By Andre Fontaine

PARIS -- At the end of last May, French and Dutch voters rejected by a strong majority the draft European constitution worked out by a convention chaired by former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing. Since all 25 member-states of the European Union had to approve the treaty, the chances of it...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

A mushroom cloud from the atomic bombing on Hiroshima taken from a U.S. military aircraft on Aug. 6, 1945. Copying the photo without permission is prohibited.

80 years on, a Japanese American hibakusha recalls the day the bomb dropped

By Elizabeth Beattie

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

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