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New Zealand's All Blacks will be looking to get off to a fast start against the Springboks in Saturday's Rugby World Cup final.
MORE SPORTS / Rugby
Oct 24, 2023

Early scores may be secret to settling outcome of World Cup final

All Blacks defense coach Scott McLeod believes the first 20 minutes of Saturday's final in Paris will determine the destination of the Webb Ellis Cup.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida listens as Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan chief Kenta Izumi speaks in parliament in Tokyo on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 24, 2023

Tough questions for Kishida in parliament over spending plans

Japan’s main opposition party began its scrutiny of Kishida's economic stimulus package as the country struggles with inflation and stagnant wages.
Great Wall Motor's Ora Good Cat electric vehicles are charged at the company's charging station at Siam Square in Bangkok
BUSINESS / Economy
Oct 27, 2023

Thailand bets on EVs to draw trillion baht in investment

The country has set up a "special operation” center to catch what its investment board head calls the "big fish” of the EV industry.
A community health worker speaks during a meeting with pregnant teenagers, teen mothers and their partners, in Navotas, Metro Manila, in 2016.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Oct 28, 2023

Can new law help tackle Philippines' teen pregnancy emergency?

The costs of teen pregnancies in the country are high, with around 30% of the population now under 15 years old.
People visit Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward on Saturday, including a handful of costumed revelers gathering in the trendy area to celebrate the weekend before Halloween.
JAPAN / Society
Oct 29, 2023

Security tight for Halloween in Shibuya as costumed crowds fail to show

Measures to deter costumed revelers from gathering in the trendy area — including a ban on street drinking — appeared to be relatively effective.
South African rugby supporters celebrate the team's World Cup triumph, in Johannesburg on Saturday.
MORE SPORTS / Rugby
Oct 29, 2023

Ecstatic South Africans celebrate Rugby World Cup glory

Supporters of the national rugby team drank beers, waved flags and partied until the early hours in a wave of jubilation that swept the country.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Oct 29, 2023

Buffaloes bounce back against Tigers to pull even in Japan Series

The Buffaloes rebounded to beat the Tigers 8-0 in Game 2 of the Japan Series after losing by the same score in Game 1.
A woman cleans a portrait displayed on a tree to mark the Day of Victims of Political Repressions, who were buried during the Stalin era in the woods on the outskirts of St. Petersburg on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 31, 2023

Russians struggle to keep alive memory of Stalin's victims

Russian President Vladimir Putin has sought to suppress attempts to evaluate Josef Stalin critically.
BUSINESS / Economy
Nov 1, 2023

Japan ramps up yen intervention warning after BOJ-fueled sell-off

The broad decline toward ¥152 to the dollar has the currency around the threshold that a year ago drove Japanese authorities to swoop in to prop it up.
Texas Rangers starting pitcher Andrew Heaney during the first inning of Game 4 of the World Series on Tuesday in Phoenix.
BASEBALL / MLB
Nov 1, 2023

Offensive explosion moves Rangers to cusp of World Series title

The Rangers rolled to an 11-7 win and are now one victory away from their first World Series championship.
The Chairman's steamed flower crab with aged Shaoxing wine and chicken oil
LIFE / Food & Drink
Nov 5, 2023

Seeking 'the perfect combination of Chinese and French cuisine'

Chefs Daniel Calvert and Danny Yip are old friends, but for the first time this month, they're collaborators.
Under President Vladimir Putin rule, reason, logic, and humanity appear to have been systematically eroded from Russian life, similar to the era of Stalin and his gulags. 
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 2, 2023

Russian life imitates dystopian art

The state in Russia has always tended toward absolutism and its coercive and penal arms have rarely wielded as much power as they do now.
Palestinians gather at the scene of a strike in a refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on Saturday.
JAPAN / Society
Nov 5, 2023

Japanese aid worker tells of her harrowing last days in Gaza

Maiko Shirane, a 36-year-old Tokyo native, says the violence she witnessed in Gaza is something "nobody should experience."
China's dominance in the electric vehicle market has prompted the European Union to take action regarding economic security.
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Nov 7, 2023

How electric vehicles became subject to EU economic security

The bloc has felt the pressure from China in the EV market, leading it to take steps to better protect vehicles, batteries and materials.
Blackstone's headquarters in New York
BUSINESS / Companies
Nov 6, 2023

Blackstone sees most Asia deal activity in Japan and India in 2024

The world’s largest alternative asset manager expects India and Japan to be its most active markets in Asia next year based on capital allocation.
Yogendra Puranik, the first person from India to win elected office in Japan, at the Indian cultural center he manages in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward in October 2022.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 6, 2023

Japan needs Indian migrants. How can it attract them?

India can help fill the domestic labor gap, but for migrants to succeed, Japan must embrace a genuinely intercultural approach.
People wait for the arrival of a train going west, in Kherson, Ukraine, on Oct. 31.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 7, 2023

Ukraine’s secret plan to save a city trapped in purgatory

Since Russian troops were pushed out of the city of Kherson, they have bombed it relentlessly. Closely held river operations could change that.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa speak as they wait for a group photo session during the Group of Seven foreign ministers meeting in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Nov 8, 2023

G7 top diplomats call for ‘humanitarian pauses’ in Israel-Hamas war

The statement didn’t mention a cease-fire, only noting the necessity of humanitarian action.
The family grave of Toshihide Matsumoto is dismantled in Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture. An increasing number of Japanese people are opting to permanently close their family graves as traditional family structures continue to change.
JAPAN / Society
Nov 9, 2023

Graying Japan faces a grave problem

Services designed to help people move or scatter their ancestors' ashes and close up family graves are experiencing increased demand.
Displaced residents of the city of Gaza walk to the southern Gaza Strip on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 9, 2023

Tens of thousands flee as Israel tightens 'stranglehold' on Gaza

U.N. rights chief Volker Turk described Israel's collective punishment of Palestinian civilians and their forcible evacuation as war crimes.
People carry posters and chant slogans on Saturday during a demonstration in Tel Aviv calling for the release of Israeli hostages taken by Palestinian militants that are currently being held in the Gaza Strip.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 13, 2023

Friends and relatives fight to keep spotlight on Israeli hostages

Many of the hostages' loved ones have traveled to Western capitals to make their cause heard among diplomats and the international media.
Overflowing trash next to a vending machine in the Asakusa district of Tokyo, which is popular with tourists, in March
JAPAN / Science & Health
Nov 18, 2023

Trash cans make techie comeback in Japan as tourists flood cities

This week, the tourist-heavy Dotonbori district in Osaka installed around 20 new technologically enabled garbage cans called SmaGO.
BASEBALL
Nov 19, 2023

Australia gains crucial experience at Asia tourney in Tokyo

For smaller baseball countries like Australia, the opportunity for its young players to play Japan at a packed Tokyo Dome is invaluable.
Japan's culture of floor-sitting stretches back to ancient times. Only in the last 60 years has it faced off against a new lifestyle brought along by the rapid spread of chairs and other high furniture.
LIFE / Lifestyle / Longform
Nov 20, 2023

Has Japan mastered sitting?

Sitting is a deceptively simple act. But the story of sitting in Japan spans centuries of culture, politics and religion.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.'s factory currently under construction in Kikuyo, Kumamoto Prefecture
BUSINESS / Tech
Nov 21, 2023

TSMC eyes third Japan chip plant with cutting-edge 3 nanometer tech

Another plant in Japan, this one making advanced 3-nanometer (3nm) chips, would potentially turn Japan into a major global chipmaking hub.
Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons celebrates after sacking Commanders quarterback Sam Howell at AT&T Stadium in Dallas on Thursday.
MORE SPORTS / Football
Nov 24, 2023

Cowboys dominate Commanders in Thanksgiving showdown

Jordan Love led the Packers to a Thanksgiving Day surprise with a win over the Lions.
JAPAN / Politics
Nov 26, 2023

Kamikawa conveys ‘comfort women’ stance to South Korean envoy

Kamikawa urged Seoul to "immediately take appropriate measures" to rectify the situation.
Yoshiko Koide sits in a classroom at Nagoya College where she teaches a Japanese-language observation seminar.
LIFE / Language / Longform
Nov 27, 2023

How a dictionary came to spark outrage among the web’s otaku

A project to create a reference book categorizing subcultures didn't seem to cause offense until it was packaged and sold as a dictionary.
Akina Shu has visited around 50 countries as a speaker and ambassador on the digital nomad lifestyle since 2020.
JAPAN / Society / FOCUS
Nov 27, 2023

Japan is enticing for digital nomads, but visa hurdles remain

While the country does not offer a digital nomad visa, the government is working on introducing one sometime in 2024.
A view inside of Sai Life Sciences' manufacturing facility in Bindar, Karnataka, India, in September.
BUSINESS / Companies
Nov 27, 2023

Indian drugmakers benefit from Big Pharma interest beyond China

Rising tensions with China have prompted more Western governments to recommend that firms "de-risk" supply chains from exposure to the Asian superpower.

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