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Chinese leader Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump meet at the Group of 20 summit in Buenos Aires in December 2018. Xi is blending Maoist resolve with pragmatic diplomacy in his foreign policy.
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Aug 8, 2025

Xi steals a page from Mao’s foreign-policy playbook

Xi foreign policy blends Maoist ideology, pragmatic statecraft and strategic patience as he advances anti-corruption efforts and selectively cooperates with the U.S.
At Himawari Shokudo 2, chef Hozumi Tanaka serves Italian-inspired fare with a focus on Toyama produce, such as this appetizer of lightly blanched "hotaru ika" (firefly squid) served atop mixed wild plants and a crepe prepared from "yamato-imo" yam.
LIFE / Food & Drink / Destination Restaurants
Aug 8, 2025

At Himawari Shokudo 2, Italian food with a Japanese soul

Punching above its own weight, the intimate restaurant is one of the growing number of quality establishments that are helping to cement Toyama's status as a dining destination.
Fukagawa Distillery's bar offers a view of the distillation still behind its walls.
LIFE / Food & Drink / Kanpai Culture
Aug 10, 2025

In a coffee-mad neighborhood, a gin distillery is a clear alternative

Located in Kiyosumi-Shirakawa, Fukagawa Distillery wants residents to “think of gin as their local drink."
People huddle near a large fan blowing icy-cold mist at the Osaka Expo on July 12. Amid Japan's relentless summer heat, organizes have put myriad measures in place in order to keep guests safe.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / OUR PLANET
Aug 10, 2025

Osaka Expo highlights the challenge of holding events in Japan's scorching summer

Giant umbrellas, mist fans and human-sized ice boxes are some of the many ways organizers are offering respite to visitors.
Ichiro speaks during a ceremony to retire his number a T-Mobile Park in Seattle on Sunday.
BASEBALL / MLB
Aug 11, 2025

Mariners to honor Ichiro with statue at T-Mobile Park in 2026

The Seattle Mariners will unveil a statue of franchise legend Ichiro Suzuki at T-Mobile Park during the 2026 season.
The Palantir logo and a rising stock graph are seen in this illustration taken Aug. 3.
BUSINESS / Tech
Aug 11, 2025

Palantir’s meteoric rise has investors scrambling to justify valuation

Shares of the defense maker closed at another all-time high Friday, bringing gains since its 2021 debut to near 2,500%.
Dalton Henry Stout, a member of the white nationalist group Aryan Freedom Network, conceals his identity during a portrait session in southern Oklahoma on May 5.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 11, 2025

American Nazis: The Aryan Freedom Network is riding high in Trump era

American neo-Nazis point to Trump’s rhetoric as driving a surge in interest and recruitment.
Kimi Ozawa, who lost her husband in the 1985 crash of a Japan Airlines jumbo jet, prays in front of his memorial marker on Tuesday in the village of Ueno, Gunma Prefecture.
JAPAN / History / FOCUS
Aug 12, 2025

Controversial theories continue to swirl around 1985 JAL jet crash

Some bereaved family members and critics who subscribe to the idea of possible SDF involvement say the initial probe left too many loose ends untied.
Hideo Shimizu, 95, says he cannot forget seeing the prisoners' bloody wills scribbled on the walls of prison cells at Unit 731 in 1945.
JAPAN / History
Aug 13, 2025

The indelible memory of being a part of Unit 731

For 95-year-old Hideo Shimizu, the 4½ months he spent with the biological and chemical warfare unit of the now-defunct Imperial Japanese Army were just like yesterday.
U.S. President Donald Trump meets with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba at the White House in Washington on Feb. 7.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 14, 2025

After serving as bulwark for 80 years, Japan's U.S. ties continue to evolve

Under the U.S. security alliance, Japan has contained potential expansion of the Soviet communist bloc and China's hegemonic ambitions since the end of World War II.
Rescued migrants rest aboard the migrant search and rescue ship Sea-Watch 5, operated by German NGO Sea-Watch, as it makes its way towards the designated port of Salerno, Italy, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Society
Aug 14, 2025

EU security measures cut illegal arrivals, but migrants take riskier routes

Experts say migrants are adapting to stricter borders controls and becoming more reliant on smugglers and newer, often more dangerous paths.
Employees work at the apparel manufacturing unit at Bhiwandi in the Thane district of India's Maharashtra state on July 30.
BUSINESS / Markets
Aug 14, 2025

Trump’s 50% tariff threatens India’s manufacturing ambitions

The U.S. is now India’s biggest export market and one of its top sources of foreign investment.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is considering issuing a formal statement on the 80th anniversary of WWII’s end. There is no shortage of opposition to the idea in his own party.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 14, 2025

Why Ishiba shouldn’t issue a WWII 80th anniversary statement

I’m not saying Japan shouldn’t have apologized, but rather that Japan has sincerely worked to resolve international issues, especially in the past 30 years.
The highly venomous lionfish with its long spotted fins can measure up to around 26 centimeters.
ENVIRONMENT / Wildlife
Aug 15, 2025

With waters at 32 C, Mediterranean tropicalization shifts into high gear

Encouraged by increasingly warm waters, hundreds of species native to the Red Sea have moved into the eastern Mediterranean, disrupting ecosystems.
Chef Kei Kobayashi is France's only Japanese chef with three Michelin stars.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Aug 15, 2025

In Paris, chefs Chizuko Kimura and Kei Kobayashi make their mark

One is the world’s first Michelin-starred female sushi chef, while the other is France’s only three-Michelin-starred Japanese chef.
South African Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana (right) and the country’s reserve bank governor, Lesetja Kganyago, attend the Group of 20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting in Cape Town on Feb. 27. 
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 18, 2025

A new trade agenda for climate-resilient development

Policymakers must be prepared to introduce new trade rules that support low-carbon transitions in Africa and across the Global South.
One of Swiss startup Enerdrape’s energy-harvesting panels is seen in this screenshot taken from video posted to the firm's YouTube account.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Aug 17, 2025

A startup is tapping underground parking garages for clean energy

Globally, heating accounts for nearly half of all energy consumption. That could make decarbonizing it a half-trillion-dollar market.
Demonstrators burn a Rising Sun flag featuring a portrait of Hideki Tojo, former leader of Japan's Imperial Army and prime minister during World War II, outside the Japanese Consulate in Hong Kong in September 2015.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 14, 2025

Continued demands for an apology ignore Japan’s postwar progress

As the 80th anniversary of World War II’s end nears, demands for renewed Japanese apologies risk empowering authoritarian narratives, especially from China.
Two boys pose with Pocari Sweat and Aquarius sports drinks in a park near Tokyo.
SPORTS
Aug 19, 2025

The great sports drink debate: What’s best for athletes?

When it comes to the classic debate of Pocari versus Aquari, fans on both sides have strong opinions about which sports drink reigns supreme.
Reigning Olympic and world javelin champion Haruka Kitaguchi poses during a photo session in the Athletics tunnel in Domazlice, Czech Republic, on August 14, 2025.
MORE SPORTS / Athletics
Aug 19, 2025

Javelin star Kitaguchi finds new home in small Czech town

The 27-year-old Japanese athlete is getting ready for next month's world championships in Tokyo in the western Czech town of Domazlice.
Muddied prospectors pan for gold in Manica province, Mozambique, near the Zimbabwe border, in 2010.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Aug 20, 2025

Mozambique's illegal miners reap risky rewards but land suffers

Rivers around mining sites are polluted, and mercury has seeped into the soil, creating a nightmare for farmers.
A damaged car in the Liuli River in the Huairou district of Beijing on Aug. 13. Flooding exposed weaknesses in the rural emergency response infrastructure for Beijing, whose urban core is surrounded by several rural districts like Huairou.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Aug 21, 2025

Is historically arid Beijing ready for a wetter future?

Recent floods revealed how historically dry Beijing, home to 22 million people, remains insufficiently prepared for what experts say will be an increasingly wet future.
Reigen, Germany's first sake brewery, makes a diverse, nontraditional range of sake that includes fruit-flavored sips and wine barrel-aged renditions.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Aug 22, 2025

Germany's first sakemaker offers a bold brew of ideas

Yellowish and high in acidity, German sake won't please the purists, but open-minded consumers, especially wine drinkers, may find something appealing.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and  Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba shake hands at joint press announcement after summit talks in Tokyo on Saturday.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 24, 2025

At meeting rich in symbolism, Ishiba and South Korea's Lee agree to steadily build ties

In the two countries' first joint document in 17 years, the leaders agreed to work together "to advance future-oriented and mutually beneficial common interests."
Chinese military personnel take part in a rehearsal ahead of the parade commemorating the 80th anniversary of the victory in the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War, which will be held on Sept. 3, in Beijing on Wednesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / FOCUS
Aug 24, 2025

History, triumph and trauma to take center stage at China's WWII military parade

The event will be a projection of China's growing military might amid deep-seated mistrust in the West and territorial rows with neighboring countries.
Japanese companies showcase products and services at a business event held on the sidelines of the Ninth Tokyo International Conference on African Development in Yokohama on Friday.
BUSINESS / Companies / FOCUS
Aug 25, 2025

Risk reduction key to boosting Japanese investment in Africa

At TICAD 9, Japan promised to help African states develop 300,000 workers in cooperation with Japanese firms.
A measles alert sign is posted outside the entrance to the Cohen Children's Medical Center in New York in March.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2025

‘Alternative facts’ aren't a reason to skip vaccines

Donald Trump’s health officials have been endorsing alternative facts in science to impose policies that contradict modern medical knowledge.
Magret John (left) delivers a sack of plastic waste collected in her neighborhood to a Human Needs Project official at a collection point in the Kibera informal settlement of Nairobi on Aug. 11.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Aug 26, 2025

'Restoring dignity': Kenya slum exchange offers water for plastic

The Human Needs Project provides water and sanitation services in a part of Kenya where they are scarce and costly.
People shop at an accessory store in the Fuyoumen Commercial Building in Shanghai on April 16.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 27, 2025

China targeting older consumers for 'silver economy' boost

Beijing flagged "a new age" for the elderly in a 2021 policy guideline, but this year, authorities have gone into overdrive.
The Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, in Bushehr Province, Iran, on May 26. Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Iran is legally obligated to allow inspections to resume and that they should begin "as soon as possible."
WORLD / Politics
Aug 28, 2025

Iran site cleanup likely to erase evidence of nuclear work, research group says

Tehran denies seeking nuclear weapons and repeatedly has said its program is for peaceful purposes.

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years