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The headquarters of Bungeishunju, Shukan Bunshun's publisher, in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 8, 2024

Comedian Hitoshi Matsumoto to withdraw Bungeishunju defamation suit

The lawsuit was filed over a Shukan Bunshun article that detailed sexual assault allegations made by two women.
The U.S. decision to suspend the use of a firing range in the Senkakus has had lasting consequences, undermining Japan's claims to the islets and sending mixed signals about U.S. support for Japanese sovereignty over the area.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 10, 2024

A restart of Senkaku firing ranges is long overdue

The suspension also had strategic consequences, depriving both U.S. and Japanese forces of vital military training ranges.
U.S. President Donald Trump welcomes Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the White House in October 2017. Canada, like other nations in the president-elect's crosshairs, is scrambling to blunt the impact of his threat to implement steep tariffs once he re-takes office.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 24, 2024

The creep of national security threatens the WTO

In Trump's mind, tariffs are the cure-all for virtually everything that ails the United States.
JAPAN
Aug 4, 2023

Seiichi Morimura, 90, who exposed Japan's wartime atrocities, dies

In a book, he detailed gruesome biological experiments on people at a secret Imperial Army site in occupied China before and during World War II.
Residents clean up debris in the aftermath of Typhoon Hagibis in Date, Fukushima Prefecture, in October 2019.
ENVIRONMENT / Earth science / OUR PLANET
Aug 20, 2023

A Japan research team dares to ask: Can typhoons be controlled?

Researchers in Yokohama are probing whether tropical cyclones can be weakened or diverted, with energy they produce also tapped to generate power.
While the Korean War armistice analogy is imperfect, it may provide the best available lesson for ending the war in Ukraine.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 1, 2023

Ukraine’s future isn’t German or Israeli but Korean

The Ukraine crisis needs a resolution, even if it means accepting an armistice that doesn't provide a clear victory for any party involved.
Finnish Army conscripts with the 2nd Military Police Company during a training exercise in a suburb of Helsinki on Sept. 6. After decades of going it alone in security issues, Finns are finding that life in a large alliance is complex, expensive and deeply political.
WORLD / Politics
Sep 26, 2023

Finland raced to join NATO. What happens next is complicated.

The country must integrate itself into the alliance and its requirement of collective defense — with all of its financial, legal and strategic hurdles.
Packages to be delivered on Amazon Prime Day in New York in 2022
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 27, 2023

Why Amazon’s online marketplace drew FTC scrutiny

The FTC’s case against Amazon is an important test of whether Lina Khan’s interpretation of the law will hold up in court.
Obtaining dual nationality and having it uniformly recognized by authorities in Japan is no simple matter.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 19, 2023

When Japan's dual nationality ban meets a legal gray zone

Lawyer Yuri Kondo decided to naturalize as an American citizen. What followed was a mix of ambiguity and the feeling of a loss of identity.
A sign at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai on July 6
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Dec 7, 2023

How AI fits into China's raft of global initiatives

The administration of President Xi Jinping has recently attached great importance to AI technology and is actively set on promoting it.
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Jan 15, 2024

All ¥500 coins that glitter are not gold

Twenty years on and the ¥2,000 note can almost certainly still be described as a “novelty" — what if the new ¥500 coin is destined for the same fate?
Business people, diplomats and academics are watching developments in Hong Kong closely, saying the prospect of new laws targeting espionage, state secrets and foreign influence could have a deep impact on the global financial hub.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jan 30, 2024

Hong Kong leaders start push to tighten national security laws

New legislation could sharpen the 2020 regulations imposed by Beijing on the territory in response to months of pro-democracy protests.
Hong Kong has been promised significant autonomy until 2047, but Beijing's actions have undermined fundamental rights essential for its success.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Feb 28, 2024

China says Hong Kong’s ‘one country, two systems’ is permanent

Hong Kong has been promised significant autonomy until 2047, but Beijing's actions have undermined fundamental rights.
The new national security law will target crimes including treason, theft of state secrets, espionage, sabotage, sedition and "external interference" including from foreign governments. The Hong Kong legislature, which is dominated by pro-Beijing lawmakers, is expected to approve it.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Feb 28, 2024

Hong Kong moves toward enacting tougher security law amid concerns about freedoms

Lawyers and activists say the law criminalizes basic human rights such as freedom of expression, but Hong Kong authorities say the new law is necessary.
People walk under flags of China and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, on Queen's Road in Hong Kong.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 20, 2024

What's in Hong Kong's new national security law?

The law's broadly defined provisions have drawn condemnation from Western countries, which had urged Hong Kong to reconsider it.
A view of the Legislative Council chamber with Chinese and Hong Kong flags reflected on the window is seen as the second reading of the Article 23 security law is read, in Hong Kong on Tuesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 23, 2024

Hong Kong's new national security law comes into force

The United States, the European Union, Japan and Britain have been among the law's strongest critics.
Legislative Council lawmakers in Hong Kong unanimously voted in favor of a new national security law on Tuesday. The legislation introduces penalties such as life imprisonment for crimes related to treason and insurrection.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 25, 2024

Is Hong Kong headed for a rubber-stamp legislature?

With the unanimous passing of the new national security law, Hong Kong's "patriotic" council has shown that its willingness to toe the government line.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump leaves the Manhattan Supreme Court on the sixth day of the hush-money trial against him on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 24, 2024

Ex-tabloid CEO says he bought and killed stories about Trump affairs

The National Enquirer's ex-CEO said he deliberately didn't publish stories about Donald Trump's affairs to help the former president's 2016 election.
The modernization of Japan's defense strategy is not just about military capabilities, it is also about building consensus and fostering public understanding.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 21, 2024

The winding road to Japan's defense modernization

The government's efforts to engage the public on defense issues are crucial for building consensus and ensuring the sustainability of defense reforms.
Volunteers from a neighborhood committee stand watch on a street in Beijing on April 3.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
May 27, 2024

Xi Jinping’s recipe for total control: An army of eyes and ears

The goal is no longer just to address specific threats, but to embed the Chinese Communist Party so deeply in daily life that no trouble can even arise.
Michael Taylor, former U.S. Green Beret and architect of the 2019 Carlos Ghosn escape plot, said that other inmates deported from Fuchu Prison to a detention center in Los Angeles were so traumatized that they ended up with psychological problems.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jun 18, 2024

Man who sprung Ghosn challenges depiction of Fuchu Prison

Michael Taylor, who served part of his sentence at the facility, said he felt the depiction had missed key elements of the "Fuchu experience."
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un toast during a reception at the Mongnangwan Reception House in Pyongyang on Wednesday following summit talks.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics / ANALYSIS
Jun 21, 2024

New Kim-Putin pact sparks unease — and talk of more aid for Ukraine

An opaque new treaty signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this week could end up bolstering U.S.-allied cooperation.
One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
PODCAST / deep dive
Jul 22, 2024

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Homeless influencers, fantasy boyfriends and bubble-era bars — Kabukicho seems to have it all.
PRESS
Jul 26, 2024

The Japan Times receives Best Aviation AI submission at 2024 Aerospace Media Awards

An article on China’s use of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) in military technology written by Gabriel Dominguez and published by The Japan Times, Ltd. (Chairperson, Publisher and President: Minako Suematsu) received an award for The Best Aviation Artificial Intelligence (AI) Submission...
Black Myth: Wukong has sold over 10 million copies in less than a week — by far the best launch of a Chinese-developed single-player game in history.
LIFE / Digital
Aug 27, 2024

With Black Myth: Wukong, China is now a force to reckon with in AAA games

Can China’s first AAA gaming hit bear the weight of the cultural baggage it’s being burdened with?
Russian President Vladimir Putin visits a drone production facility of the the Special Technology Center in St. Petersburg on Sept. 19.
WORLD
Sep 26, 2024

Russia has a secret war drones project in China, intel sources say

Both Russia and Ukraine are racing to ramp up their production of drones, which have emerged as highly effective weapons in the war.
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a news conference at the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Oct 25, 2024

Putin appears to hint that North Korean troops are in Russia

Putin's comments came as Ukraine’s intelligence agency said that North Korean soldiers had already arrived in Russia's Kursk region.
Environmental activists demonstrate in front of the convention center in Busan, South Korea, where delegates from around the world are seeking to reach a binding treaty against plastic waste.
ENVIRONMENT
Nov 29, 2024

Showdown looms on plastic treaty days before deadline

With just two days of talks left, countries seeking an ambitious treaty urged delegations that "have not moved a centimeter" to make compromises or "get out of the way."
Plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Japan's same-sex marriage ban, along with their lawyers and supporters, hold signs saying the court ruled the ban as unconstitutional on Friday in front of the Fukuoka High Court.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Dec 13, 2024

Fukuoka High Court rules ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional

It is the third such high court ruling so far in Japan after the Sapporo High Court in March and the Tokyo High Court in October.
Then-economy minister Yasutoshi Nishimura marks the opening of the carbon credit market at the Tokyo Stock Exchange in October 2023. The GX League, which includes the emissions trading system, already covers over half of Japan’s emissions.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 3, 2025

Japan poised to lead in a brighter carbon market era

The patchy, voluntary nature of carbon markets around the world is finally changing after world leaders agreed to a new system for trading emissions reductions across borders.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami