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U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Washington on Sept. 26. There is increasing pressure in the U.S. for a negotiated settlement, but finding a viable peace solution amid Ukraine's deteriorating conditions is complex.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 30, 2024

Trump, Harris, Zelenskyy — no one’s plan will end the war

There is increasing pressure in the U.S. for a negotiated settlement, but finding a viable peace solution amid Ukraine's deteriorating conditions is complex.
As the European Commission prepares to make decisions on Google’s practices by the end of 2024, there is hope for a collaborative approach with U.S. regulators to create meaningful structural reforms.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 20, 2024

Google’s breakup needs an international tag team

There’s a growing consensus among regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to redefine antitrust harm beyond just pricing issues.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un attend a state reception in Pyongyang on June 19.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 6, 2024

Xi’s balancing act on Ukraine disrupted by Putin-Kim alliance

Beijing has portrayed itself as neutral regarding the war in Ukraine while looking to improve ties with the U.S. and its allies.
Singtel uncovered the breach of its network after detecting suspicious data traffic in a core back-end router and finding what it believed was sophisticated, and possibly state-sponsored, malware on it, according to a person familiar with the investigation.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Nov 6, 2024

Chinese group accused of hacking Singapore's Singtel in telecom attacks

The breach of Singtel, which has operations throughout Southeast Asia and Australia, was seen as a test run by China for further hacks against U.S. firms.
American voters in Tokyo gather at an election watch party, organized by Democrats Abroad Japan, at a British bar in Tokyo's Shimokitazawa district on Wednesday.
JAPAN
Nov 6, 2024

American voters in Japan reflect divisions in home country

Several Republican voters said they believed Trump’s leadership could address the problems they are most concerned about, such as illegal immigration.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump takes the stage to address supporters at his rally, at the Palm Beach County Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Nov. 6.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 7, 2024

Trump 2.0: Who is in the running for top jobs in Trump's second administration?

Trump’s potential cabinet choices signal a hard-line approach, prioritizing tariffs, strict immigration policies, and assertive national security strategies.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Xi Jinping, China's president, shake hands during a news conference at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Nov. 9, 2017.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Nov 7, 2024

Xi is better prepared for Trump even as 60% tariffs risk chaos

Xi would much prefer to avoid a tariff battle that risks proving much more devastating than the first round.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump greets Sen. Marco Rubio during a campaign rally in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Nov. 4. Trump is expected to name Rubio, a loyalist who Trump passed over as his vice presidential running mate, as secretary of state.
JAPAN / Politics
Nov 12, 2024

Trump diplomacy and security picks likely to anger China but reassure Japan

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is expected to select Sen. Marco Rubio to be his secretary of state and Rep. Mike Waltz to be national security adviser.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (left) shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping after a signing ceremony held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing in April 2023.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 14, 2024

Lula’s embrace of Xi sets up a clash over Trump’s China policy

Brazil’s geography and colonial history meant that it has traditionally looked to the Atlantic for commerce. Now it’s deepening ties with the Asia Pacific.
Anduril Industries' Ghost-X unmanned aircraft is one of the systems included in the next tranche of the Pentagon's Replicator program that it plans to field from August next year.
WORLD
Nov 14, 2024

Pentagon unveils more Replicator drones to counter China

This is just the second time the U.S. has provided specifics on what it’s buying in its move to field thousands of cheap, smart and autonomous attack drones.
A newly elected Donald Trump will encounter a changed Middle East where he will be forced to challenge Iran's influence and curb its nuclear ambitions — a path that is fraught with complications.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 15, 2024

Iran is much weaker than the last time it faced Trump

Today, Israel has crippled Hamas in Gaza, and in Lebanon, Hezbollah can still fire rockets, but Israel has decimated its leadership.
Marco Rubio debates Donald Trump during the 2016 Republican presidential primary race. The president-elect has named the senator from Florida as his prospective secretary of state.
EDITORIALS
Nov 15, 2024

Trump’s Cabinet picks make clear his priorities. Allies get ready.

Trump claims a mandate — winning the popular vote and both Houses of Congress — but his margin of victory is smaller than he will admit.
Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives for a bilateral meeting Peruvian President Dina Boluarte at the Government Palace in Lima on Nov. 14.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 20, 2024

Xi’s push for stable world of low tariffs undone by Trump and Putin

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is threatening to put 60% tariffs on Chinese goods while China walks a tightrope regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
In developing Asia, where coal dominates and imported liquefied natural gas is expensive, natural gas remains limited in electricity grids.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 24, 2024

Gas got America off coal. Now, it's coming for Asia's oil.

It can work in concert with carbon-free energy to break the hold of the dirtiest sources of power.
Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun attends the opening ceremony of the Xiangshan Forum at the Beijing International Convention Center on Sept. 13. Dong is the third consecutive incumbent or former defense chief to be probed over alleged corruption.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Nov 27, 2024

China defense minister being investigated for corruption, report says

The probe could undermine efforts to maintain military-to-military communications just months before Donald Trump returns to the White House.
Fentanyl pills found by officers from the Drug Enforcement Administration in New York on Oct. 4, 2022
WORLD / Politics
Nov 28, 2024

Trump places high-risk, high-reward bet on tariffs to stem fentanyl

The U.S. president-elect has vowed to impose tariffs on China and Mexico unless they stem the flow of fentanyl and migrants across the U.S. border.
Then-U.S. President Donald Trump attends the Group of 20 summit in Osaka in June 2019.
EDITORIALS
Nov 29, 2024

Japan should prepare for tariff-loving Trump

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's focus on tariffs as a core economic strategy could disrupt global trade.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leaves the Delta Hotel on his way to meet U.S. President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago, in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Friday.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 30, 2024

Canada’s Justin Trudeau holds crucial meeting with Trump in Florida

Trudeau was the first Group of Seven leader to have a face-to-face meeting with Trump since the U.S. election.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum delivers a speech during the inauguration of a family medicine unit in San Nicolas de los Garza, Nuevo Leon State, Mexico, on Saturday.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Dec 1, 2024

Trump’s demand that Mexico stop migrants and drugs may never be met

Mexico's new leader must find ways to appease Trump while avoiding the perception that she easily bends to U.S. demands.
A serviceman with the Ukrainian Army's 24th mechanized brigade fires a machine gun during an exercise, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in the country's Donetsk region on Friday.
WORLD / Politics / ANALYSIS
Dec 2, 2024

Europe eyes 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine as possible peace deal option

The troop presence is among security guarantees being considered as the possibility grows of a deal requiring Kyiv to cede territory to Moscow.
Nissan Motor vehicles bound for shipment at the Nissan Oppama wharf in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 3, 2024

Nissan is awash in outdated models as car buyers look elsewhere

While Japan’s other major carmakers take six months or more to ship a new vehicle, many of Nissan’s most popular models can be delivered within a month or two.
A demonstrator wearing a mask of President Yoon Suk Yeol dances near a line of police officers across the street from the main gate to the National Assembly building in Seoul on Wednesday.
BUSINESS
Dec 4, 2024

South Korea’s whirlwind stint in martial law jolts markets

The move sparked whiplash in the country’s foreign-traded assets and caught global markets off guard.
Then-U.S. Presidential nominee Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet at Trump Tower in New York City in September.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 5, 2024

Trump's plan for Ukraine comes into focus, with ceding land possible

Other options allegedly being explored for ending the war include taking NATO membership for Ukraine off the table.
Makoto Uchida, President and CEO of Nissan, holds a press briefing at the Japan Mobility Show 2023 in Tokyo on Oct. 25, 2023. Uchida is under presser to deliver a turnaround and to keep his job at the troubled carmaker.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 8, 2024

Nissan boss Uchida races to save the automaker — and his job

Makoto Uchida is under pressure to reverse Nissan’s fortunes after years of turmoil following the 2018 arrest of former chairman Carlos Ghosn.
Then-U.S. President Donald Trump looks on as Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks at the White House in Washington on Nov. 2, 2017.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 9, 2024

Trump says he has no plan to remove Powell as Fed chair

Powell, whose term expires in May 2026, told reporters last month that he wouldn’t step aside early if Trump asked for his resignation.
Rebel commander Ahmed al-Sharaa, better known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, speaks to a crowd in Damascus, Syria, on Monday.
WORLD
Dec 10, 2024

Syria's rebels work to form government and restore order after Assad ouster

With the mood in Damascus still celebratory, Assad's prime minister, Mohammed Jalali, has agreed to hand power to the rebel-led Salvation Government.
There is no guarantee that bird flu will ever begin transmitting between humans, and U.S. health authorities have emphasized that the risk to the general public remains low.
WORLD
Dec 12, 2024

'Knocking on our door': Experts warn of bird flu's pandemic threat

U.S. health authorities have emphasized that the risk to the general public remains low.
A screen shot from YouTube user @lagelda shows the simplicity of going viral in Japan in 2024: A cat dancing to EDM in front of a green screen.
LIFE / Digital / Japan Pulse
Dec 17, 2024

Curiosity didn’t kill the meme: Why cats still rule Japanese YouTube

Cat memes continued to thrive and evolve in 2024. In Japan, they're not just for jokes — they’re for storytelling, venting and a little therapy.
Sulaiman, a Rohingya refugee who recently fled Myanmar, poses for a picture at a refugee camp near the town of Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, on Nov. 22.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 17, 2024

How Myanmar’s junta is suppressing information about a hunger crisis

Junta representatives have warned aid workers against releasing data and analysis that indicate millions of people in Myanmar are experiencing serious hunger.
U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer
WORLD / Politics
Dec 17, 2024

Starmer’s China reset plans get undercut by royal access scandal

It has emerged in court documents that a Chinese man who acted as a business adviser to the Duke of York was banned from Britain on national security grounds in 2023.

Longform

Figure skater Akiko Suzuki was once told her ideal weight should be 47 kilograms, a number she now admits she “naively believed.” This led to her have a relationship with food that resulted in her suffering from anorexia.
The silent battle Japanese athletes fight with weight