Search - 2023

 
 
Former Bank of Japan Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda said Japan must fix "any misunderstanding" held by U.S. President Donald Trump that its central bank was intentionally weakening the yen with monetary policy.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 8, 2025

Japan must fix 'misunderstanding' it is manipulating yen, says ex-BOJ chief Kuroda

Trump said he had told Japan and China they could not continue to reduce the value of their currencies, as doing so would be unfair to the United States.
Iran's Russian-built Bushehr nuclear power plant in the south of the country
WORLD
Mar 9, 2025

Trump administration ends Iraq's waiver to buy Iranian electricity

Trump restored "maximum pressure" on Iran in one of his first acts after returning to office in January.
Toyota will suspend three lines at two plants in Aichi Prefecture on Monday.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 9, 2025

Explosion and fire lead Toyota to halt production at two plants in Aichi from Monday

The suspension is believed to be due to the effects of an explosion and fire accident at a plant of Chuo Spring, a Toyota affiliate, on Thursday.
Seven & I Holdings says it has agreed to jointly explore store sell-offs with Alimentation Couche-Tard to address antitrust concerns ahead of a potential merger.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 10, 2025

Shareholder pushes Seven & I to engage with Couche-Tard

The operator of 7-Eleven stores says that it is doing so, and has rebuffed Artisan Partners Asset Management’s assertions of conflicts of interest within the board.
Jewish settlers pray in the Evyatar settler outpost in the northern West Bank last July
WORLD / Politics
Mar 10, 2025

Christians press Trump to clear path for Israel to annex West Bank

Some 80% of white, evangelical Christians voted for President Trump. Now, some want a policy change that could undermine a future Palestinian state.
Excavators to be used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to remove debris from homes destroyed by the Eaton Fire in Altadena, California
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / FOCUS
Mar 10, 2025

Cascading extreme weather events unleash billions in damages globally

Compound weather, when two or more concurrent events that collectively yield a result worse than if each had occurred on its own, are occurring more frequently.
Seahawks wide receiver DK Metcalf (left) catches a pass for a touchdown over Vikings cornerback Stephon Gilmore during the first half at Lumen Field on Dec. 22, 2024.
SPORTS / Football
Mar 10, 2025

Steelers obtain wide receiver DK Metcalf from Seahawks

Metcalf reportedly will sign a five-year, $150 million deal with the Steelers.
The Ukedo Elementary School Ruins in Namie, Fukushima Prefecture, in January. The Fukushima Prefectural Government offers training sessions for new prefectural government recruits to visit the school, the prefecture's sole preserved disaster-hit structure.
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2025

14 years on, prefectural governments work to pass on lessons to new hires

Many prefectural officials who were involved in front-line operations in the immediate aftermath of the massive earthquake and tsunami are retiring.
China’s overnight and seven-day repo rates surged in February, while bond investors took losses from a sharp rise in yields.
BUSINESS / Markets
Mar 10, 2025

‘Impossible trinity’ conundrum has caused a cash crunch in Asia

Countries can’t simultaneously control their currencies, independently set interest rates and allow capital to move freely across borders — something will break or give way.
Every year, there is heightened interest in commemorating the 3/11 disaster around the time of the anniversary. But memorial facilities and operators are increasingly struggling to keep their activities going all year round and as time passes.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 10, 2025

Preserving the memory of 3/11 is becoming more difficult

Despite a peak in interest around the 3/11 anniversary, disaster memorial facilities and operators are facing mounting challenges in keeping their activities going as time passes.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba speaks at an Upper House Budget Committee session in Tokyo on Monday. The opposition's slamming of the Liberal Democratic Party over its position on corporate and group donations, as well as their own divisions over whether to restrict or ban such contributions, cast uncertainty over Ishiba’s hopes of reaching a consensus within the month.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 10, 2025

Opposition parties split on whether to restrict or ban corporate donations

Their division casts uncertainty over Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba’s hopes of reaching a consensus on the matter within the month ahead of a summer election.
Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte speaks during a gathering with the Philippine community in Hong Kong on March 9.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Mar 11, 2025

Former Philippine President Duterte arrested over crimes against humanity

Police in Manila acted on an International Criminal Court warrant tied to Duterte's deadly war on drugs.
Tetsuya Tadano gazes at the school building from the hillside behind Okawa Elementary School on Feb. 7 in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture.
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2025

Former students work to turn tsunami-hit elementary school into social hub

One former student felt the school has become increasingly defined solely by the tragedy.
Yankees starting pitcher Gerrit Cole participates in spring training workouts at George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, Florida on Feb. 13.
BASEBALL
Mar 11, 2025

Yankees ace Cole to have season-ending elbow surgery

The Yankees confirmed that Cole would have Tommy John surgery on Tuesday to repair a torn right ulnar collateral ligament.
A woman visits a grave in Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, on Tuesday on the 14th anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake. Populations in the hardest hit prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima are sharply falling.
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2025

Post-disaster Tohoku struggles with population decline

The number of people aged 20 to 39 in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima prefectures fell by about 20% to 30% between 2010 and 2024.
Minnesota Vikings quarterback Sam Darnold against the Los Angeles Rams during an NFC wild card game at State Farm Stadium on Jan. 13. Darnold reportedly plans to sign with the Seahawks.
MORE SPORTS / Football
Mar 11, 2025

QB Sam Darnold to sign $100 million contract with Seahawks: reports

Darnold parlayed a career season with the Minnesota Vikings into the largest contract of his career.
A Vietnamese worker harvests tomatoes at a farm in the city of Asahi, Chiba Prefecture, in 2018.
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2025

Amid labor shortage, Japan approves guidelines to upskill foreign workers

The new program aims to nurture trainees into skilled workers to motivate them to remain in the country.
A man walks past an electronic board showing the Nikkei 225 index on the Tokyo Stock Exchange along a street in the capital on Tuesday.
BUSINESS / Markets
Mar 11, 2025

Asian stocks slide as U.S. growth worries grip markets

In Asia, stocks were battered across the board with Japan's Nikkei and Taiwan stocks hitting their lowest levels since September.
Many in Japan are increasingly concerned that under the Trump administration's shifting policies, the U.S. may no longer be a reliable ally, raising fears of a weakened security partnership amid rising threats from China and Russia.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 11, 2025

Japan reels from — and steels for — U.S. policy shifts

“What Japan has learned from the Ukraine war is that the era where we could rely entirely on the U.S. is over.”
Fertility rates remain low across much of Asia, with past policies to curb population growth proving difficult to reverse, while governments explore adaptation strategies like immigration and AI.
COMMENTARY
Mar 5, 2025

It’s time we adapt to low fertility rates

South Korea’s fertility rate saw a slight increase, but experts doubt it signals a long-term reversal. Similar trends are seen in Singapore and Japan.
A sign featuring the logo of Germany's Federal Ministry For Economic Affairs And Climate Action, at the construction site of the Northvolt Drei EV battery gigafactory in Heide, Germany, on Oct. 15, 2024
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 12, 2025

If Europe builds the gigafactories, will an AI industry come?

The hope is that local firms like France's Mistral will use the factories to create AI models that operate in line with EU safety rules.
McLaren's Oscar Piastri ahead of pre-season testing in Bahrain on Feb. 27
MORE SPORTS / Auto Racing
Mar 12, 2025

Piastri commits long-term to McLaren

Piastri won a sprint race in his rookie season and finished fourth overall in 2024, when he was also the only driver to complete every racing lap.
PSG's Gianluigi Donnarumma celebrates after the match against Liverpool at Anfield on Tuesday.
SOCCER
Mar 12, 2025

Transformed PSG makes statement by ousting Liverpool

PSG was formerly almost a laughing stock around Europe for its ability to lose big Champions League knockout ties in improbable circumstances.
The Osaka Prefectural Police headquarters in the city of Osaka. Police there arrested three people on Tuesday, including a self-proclaimed spiritual leader and fortune teller, on suspicion of inciting two men to kill themselves five years ago.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 12, 2025

'Spiritual leader' and accomplices arrested over suicides of two men

The "spiritual leader" and her suspected accomplices were also arrested for allegedly forging a suicide note for one of the men.
Protesters demonstrating in front of the Supreme Court in Tokyo on Tuesday against court rulings acquitting two former executives of Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings over the 2011 nuclear disaster in Fukushima Prefecture.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 12, 2025

Acquittal of two former Tepco executives finalized

Lawyers acting as prosecutors did not file an appeal against the Supreme Court's decision last week that upheld the not-guilty verdicts against the executives.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt holds up a piece of paper with information about tariff rates at the White House on Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 12, 2025

The U.S. says Japan has a 700% tariff on American rice. Is that the case?

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt's accusation describes only a small portion of U.S. rice imported by Japan.
Bookshelves storing disaster-related documents at the Sendai City Archives in Sendai in February
JAPAN
Mar 12, 2025

Local governments struggle to preserve records of March 2011 disaster

Fourteen years later, securing storage space has become a growing obstacle as the volume of records continues to increase.
Masao Adachi’s “Escape” is a fictionalized biopic about fugitive Satoshi Kirishima, played by Rairu Sugita (left) and Kanji Furutachi (right).
CULTURE / Film
Mar 13, 2025

‘Escape’: Masao Adachi’s fugitive biopic salutes a kindred spirit

The 85-year-old director keeps his revolutionary fire burning with a respectful portrait of a wanted terrorist who spent nearly half a century on the run.
An electronic dictionary section at a mass retailer in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward in 2005
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 13, 2025

Electronic dictionary market shrinking in Japan

Sales of electric dictionaries are falling in Japan amid declining birthrates and widespread use of smartphone apps.
Blue pipelines to transport seawater, part of the facility operated by Tepco where treated radioactive water is released from the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant into the sea, are seen during a treated water dilution and discharge facility tour for foreign media in the town of Futaba, Fukushima Prefecture, in August 2023.
JAPAN
Mar 13, 2025

Tepco releases treated water from Fukushima plant for last time in fiscal 2024

The operator of the nuclear plant plans to discharge 7,800 tons of treated water containing tritium, a radioactive substance, into the Pacific during the current release.

Longform

In 2020, 38% of all households were single-person. That figure is projected to rise to 44.3% by 2050.
The rise of AI companionship in a lonely Japan