Search - 2023

 
 
The moon rises behind the State Historical Museum, the Kremlin's towers and St. Basil's Cathedral in central Moscow on March 21. Russia has dismissed new allegations about its role in Havana syndrome as "groundless."
WORLD / Politics
Apr 2, 2024

'Havana Syndrome' linked to Russian intelligence unit, report says

The U.S. State Department has said it stands by its assessment that no foreign actor is responsible.
A customer walks past a display for Nintendo's Super Mario at an electronics store in Tokyo on Jan. 12. Last year, Nintendo increased salaries, in part to be competitive with other studios.
BUSINESS
Apr 2, 2024

Japan’s game industry weathers the storm amid layoffs worldwide

The country's studios are actually scrambling to attract and retain talent — a state of affairs that is symptomatic of the nation’s demographic challenges.
People ride bikes without wearing helmets in Tokyo in March 2023, just before a law revision over helmet wearing on April 1 that year.
JAPAN
Apr 2, 2024

One year after road law revision, few cyclists in Japan wear helmets

The helmet wearing rate among cyclists killed or injured in accidents between April and December 2023 was 14.7%, the National Police Agency said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un looks on as he guides a training of the fire division in this picture released on March 19. Pyongyang has spent decades stockpiling millions of rounds of artillery and thousands of rockets in the terrain north of the demilitarized zone, which sits some 40 kilometers away from Seoul.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 3, 2024

Kim Jong Un faces annihilation in nearly all Korea war scenarios

Although North Korea has a manpower advantage, the bulk of its forces rely on "increasingly obsolete equipment” dating back to Soviet era.
Hakuoho (right) shoves out Aoiyama during the Nagoya Basho in July last year. The promising young wrestler is now part of Terunofuji's Isegahama stable after the Miyagino stable was forced to close following a bullying scandal.
SUMO / INSIDE SUMO
Apr 3, 2024

With absorption of Miyagino stable, Isegahama looks to be building sumo super team

Whether it’s Real Madrid’s famous Galacticos or the 2024 Dodgers, few things in sport divides opinion among fans more than the creation of a super team.
Seiya Suzuki in action during a game on Sunday against the Rangers. The Japanese outfielder hit his first home run of the season on Tuesday night in the Cubs' blowout win over the Rockies.
BASEBALL / MLB
Apr 3, 2024

Cubs and Seiya Suzuki blow out Rockies

Seiya Suzuki began the Cubs' offensive onslaught in the bottom of the first inning, while Garrett Cooper went 3-for-4 and drove in three runs en route to a 12-2 win for Chicago over the Colorado Rockies on Tuesday night at Wrigley Field.
Warnings have been issued for people to safely use household appliances, including gas stoves.
JAPAN
Apr 3, 2024

Warnings issued for household safety in Japan's new fiscal year

The guidelines aim to raise awareness on product safety and mitigate potential risks surrounding household appliances.
Leftover premium-brand chocolate, originally slated for disposal, is made available for purchase at a discount in Tokyo's Chuo Ward on Feb. 15, the day after Valentine's Day.
JAPAN / Society
Apr 3, 2024

Efforts to reduce food waste find support in Japan but still face challenges

Initiatives are being introduced to avoid the waste of seasonal delicacies, but challenges such as entrenched commercial customs persist.
Abe no Seimei (Kento Yamazaki), an apprentice at a school of mystic arts, gets wrapped up in a murder investigation in “The Yin Yang Master Zero.”
CULTURE / Film
Apr 4, 2024

‘The Yin Yang Master Zero’: Imaginative action film casts a dazzling spell

Shimako Sato’s VFX-heavy, big-budget fantasy about practitioners of mystic arts goes beyond the genre standard.
Peru's President Dina Boluarte, who is facing an inquiry into possible illicit enrichment and failure to declare ownership of luxury watches, addresses the audience during an assistance program for the elderly, in Lima on Feb. 22.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 3, 2024

How Rolexes put Peru's presidency at risk

Dina Boluarte is under investigation for illicit enrichment for possessing luxury timepieces watches without proving how she got them.
Russian Army servicemen stand near a mobile recruiting center in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 4, 2024

Russia says concert attack has spurred army recruitment

Russia is relying on a steady stream of new recruits to the armed forces as it seeks to push deeper into Ukrainian territory.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell
WORLD / Politics
Apr 4, 2024

Senior U.S. diplomat links AUKUS submarine pact to Taiwan

The project involves Australia acquiring nuclear-powered attack submarines as part of the allies' efforts to push back against China's growing power.
Philippine Ambassador Mylene Garcia-Albano is interviewed at the country's embassy in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Apr 4, 2024

Closer defense ties expected after first U.S.- Japan-Philippines summit, Manila's envoy says

The statement comes amid media reports that the three countries plan to launch joint naval patrols in the South China Sea later this year.
Ferrari's Carlos Sainz Jr., RB's Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull's Max Verstappen, Williams' Alexander Albon, Mercedes' George Russell and Alpine's Pierre Gasly during a news conference in Suzuka, Mie Prefecture, on Thursday
MORE SPORTS / Auto Racing
Apr 4, 2024

Five drivers to watch this weekend at Suzuka

The battles that take place further down the grid promise plenty of excitement this weekend.
Historian Frederik Cryns’ “In the Service of the Shogun” is a biography of William Adams, the inspiration for the character John Blackthorne (played by Cosmo Jarvis) in “Shogun.” Cryns also served as a historical adviser on the FX TV series.
CULTURE / Books
Apr 4, 2024

'Shogun' adviser dives into main character's real-life counterpart for new book

After working on the FX TV series, historian Frederik Cryns explores the life of William Adams in detail for his biography, "In the Service of the Shogun."
People visit to view cherry blossoms in full bloom at Chidorigafuchi, one of the moats around the Imperial Palace, in Tokyo on Thursday.
JAPAN
Apr 4, 2024

Tokyo crowds revel as cherry blossoms reach full bloom

The Meteorological Agency declared that Japan's most common and popular Somei Yoshino variety of cherry tree was in full bloom.
Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya crosses the finish line to win gold in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics men's marathon, in Sapporo in August 2021.
OLYMPICS / Athletics
Apr 5, 2024

Kipchoge retained in Kenya's slimmed down Olympics marathon squad

The runner is bidding to become the first athlete to win three Olympic marathon golds.
Since the original 2010 release, visual novel series Danganronpa has spawned eight mainline games (and several other titles) for a total 5 million copies sold worldwide.
LIFE / Digital / ON: GAMES
Apr 6, 2024

Are visual novels ready for a great leap forward?

Where reaction time and manual reflexes are in other genres, visual novels prize critical thinking and the ability to interpret characters’ motivations.
If it's too hot to do much (and the costs for air conditioning continue to surge) during the day, it might be time to consider shifting the bulk of our activities to cooler nighttime hours.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Apr 6, 2024

A solution for scorching days: Do everything at night.

Working night shifts, however, comes with a host of health problems, increasing the risk of diabetes, heart disease and even cancer.
Japanese household spending fell 0.5% in February from a year earlier, down for a 12th straight month, indicating the impact of persistent price increases on spending patterns.
BUSINESS / Economy
Apr 5, 2024

Japan’s households continue to cut outlays as inflation hits

Outlays decreased 0.5% in February from a year ago, sliding for a 12th consecutive month.
Hamas traffics in outrage and one of its primary objectives with the Oct. 7 atrocities was to goad the Jewish state into indiscriminate attacks — and that is what Israel gave it. 
EDITORIALS
Apr 5, 2024

Israel needs to stop killing civilians immediately

Israel must wake up to the suffering it is inflicting on innocent people and the damage it is doing to its image and reputation.
A worker inadvertently discovered that the latest version of the open source software program XZ Utils had been deliberately sabotaged by one of its developers, a move that could have carved out a secret door to millions of servers across the internet.
WORLD
Apr 6, 2024

Why a near-miss cyberattack put U.S. officials and the tech industry on edge

Security experts say it’s only because a change was accidentally spotted that the world was spared a digital security crisis.
Drivers in California’s Marin County rely on a single hydrogen fueling station.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Apr 6, 2024

Few stations and $200 to fill up: Life on California’s ‘hydrogen highway’

Fuel shortages and soaring prices have stalled the adoption of hydrogen cars — but proponents aren’t throwing in the towel.
People holding Mexican flags protest outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in Mexico City on Saturday, following the severing of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 7, 2024

Ecuador in diplomatic storm after raid at Mexican Embassy

The Vienna Convention, a treaty governing international relations, states that a country cannot intrude upon an embassy on its territory.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen speaks with the media after meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng at the Guangdong Zhudao Guesthouse in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, on Saturday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 7, 2024

China providing geospatial intelligence to Russia, U.S. warns

Beijing’s support also includes optics, propellants to be used in missiles and increased space cooperation, according to sources.
A helmet jellyfish recorded at depth in the Lurefjord, Norway. The creatures experience acute physical effects from short-term exposure to suspended sediment, which could be caused by deep-sea mining.
ENVIRONMENT / Wildlife / OUR PLANET
Apr 7, 2024

The weird deep-sea world, and how mining threatens it

Demand for metals such as lithium and nickel has driven a rush to take a stake in the seabed, with Japan being a major advocate of deep-sea mining.
China’s greenhouse footprint can be boiled down to three factors: its economic growth, the energy intensity of that growth and the carbon intensity of that energy.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 7, 2024

China’s growth ambitions will erase the world’s climate gains

Global greenhouse pollution hit a record and increased 1.1% last year, the International Energy Agency reported. That was almost entirely a China story.
U.S. President Joe Biden, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and British leader Rishi Sunak deliver remarks on the AUKUS partnership, after a trilateral meeting, at Naval Base Point Loma in San Diego in March last year.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 7, 2024

AUKUS weighs expanding security pact to deter China, report says

Rahm Emanuel, the outspoken U.S. ambassador in Tokyo, wrote in a recent commentary that Japan was "about to become the first additional Pillar II partner."
South Korea is seeking to step up its own reconnaissance capabilities with a series of launches aimed at putting five spy satellites in orbit by 2025.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 8, 2024

South Korea launches second homegrown spy satellite

The synthetic aperture radar satellite uses radar waves to produce ultrahigh resolution images of objects on the ground, regardless of cloud cover.
A lone Tesla charges in the basement of a commercial property in Tokyo. One of Japan’s biggest obstacles to electric vehicles is subpar charging infrastructure.
BUSINESS / Companies
Apr 8, 2024

How three high-tech countries became laggards in electric vehicles

Japan's slow adoption traces back to a decade-old bet on hydrogen fuel-cell technology, while U.S. and South Korea have hit bottlenecks.

Longform

After pandemic-era border regulations eased, Indian migrants began returning to Japan. Their population now stands at more than 50,000 across the country.
How remote work is rewriting the migrant experience in Japan