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Chinese President Xi Jinping’s government has so far shown restraint in responding to a drumbeat of U.S. trade curbs, but driving TikTok out of the U.S. could challenge that calibration.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 25, 2024

TikTok ultimatum puts U.S. firms in firing line for China response

Legislation approved on Wednesday would give parent company ByteDance nearly a year to divest the video-sharing platform before facing an outright ban.
Recent cases of alleged Chinese espionage in Germany and Britain are the latest reminder of Beijing's immense intelligence network and its ability to penetrate into the heart of European capitals.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 25, 2024

Europe ill-prepared to counter China's espionage push, analysts say

This week's cases of alleged Chinese spying in Germany and Britain are the latest reminder of Beijing's immense intelligence network.
Everywhere, U.S. allies are taking steps to defend or advance their interests in the event former U.S. President Donald Trump returns to power in November elections, an even chance based on recent opinion polls in swing states.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Apr 25, 2024

How U.S. allies are preparing for a possible second Trump term

They want to avoid Trump's "America First" policies dealt them before, which included trade wars and a shakeup of security alliances.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing on Friday
WORLD / Politics
Apr 26, 2024

Top U.S. and China diplomats talk tough amid warnings of new ‘downward spiral’

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi did not mince words when addressing a raft of contentious topics, including trade, Ukraine and Taiwan.
Chelsea defender Alfie Gilchrist celebrates after scoring the club's sixth goal during their English Premier League football match against Everton on April 15.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 25, 2024

Arsenal? Liverpool? Chelsea? Help me pick my 'football' team

This writer’s been in England for six years. It’s time he backed a club.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken attends a joint ministerial meeting of the GCC-U.S. Strategic Partnership in Riyadh to discuss the humanitarian crises in the Gaza, on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 30, 2024

U.S. warns ICC action on Israel would hurt cease-fire chances

The U.S. and its allies are concerned that the International Criminal Court may issue arrest warrants for Israeli officials just as the country is getting closer to a ceasefire agreement with Hamas, potentially jeopardizing a deal, people familiar with the matter said.
(From left) Nanami Fukuoka, Natsumi Matsunaga and Riana Tashima, students from Denshukan High School in Yanagawa, Fukuoka Prefecture, and Mutsumi Machitori, their teacher, show their research in late March.
JAPAN / History / Regional Voices: Kyushu
May 6, 2024

Students in Fukuoka learn of school's tragic past in World War II

After investigating a cenotaph at their school, pupils researched 17 alumni who died at a nearby munitions factory.
The United Nations Security Council votes on a Gaza resolution that demands an immediate cease-fire between Israel and Hamas and unconditional release of all hostages, at the U.N.'s headquarters in New York on March 25. So far, such resolutions have proven ineffective.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 30, 2024

Can ‘minilaterals’ save the world?

Minilateral partnerships offer a new approach to addressing regional challenges effectively and ensuring peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific.
Local residents look at damage at a site of a Russian missile strike in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
May 2, 2024

U.S. issues hundreds of sanctions targeting Russia and takes aim at Chinese firms

Of the nearly 300 targets onto which the U.S. imposed sanctions, 20 are companies based in China and Hong Kong.
Attendees at the Leap technology conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on March 6, 202. The oil-rich country is plowing money into glitzy events, computing power and artificial intelligence research, putting it in the middle of an escalating U.S.-China struggle for technological influence.
WORLD / Politics
May 2, 2024

‘To the future’: Saudi Arabia spends big to become an AI superpower

Saudi Arabia was long a financial spigot for tech, but is now building its own industry.
A girl walks past a tent sprayed with a message of gratitude to pro-Palestinian university students in the U.S. amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
May 3, 2024

Why Palestinians can count on U.S. students but not Arab allies to protest

Reasons range from a fear of angering autocratic governments to political differences with Hamas or doubts that it could impact state policy.
Scientists have observed an orangutan applying medicinal herbs to a face wound in an apparently successful attempt to heal an injury, the first time such behavior has been recorded.
WORLD / Science & Health
May 3, 2024

Orangutan's use of medicinal plant to treat wound intrigues scientists

Researchers said they believed this was the first documented case of a wild animal self-treating a wound.
Palestinian group Hamas' top leader, Ismail Haniyeh, speaks during a news conference in Tehran on March 26.
WORLD / Politics
May 4, 2024

Hamas says delegation heading to Cairo for truce talks

Mediators have been waiting for a Hamas response to a proposal to halt the fighting for 40 days and exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners.
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus attends a news conference at WHO headquarters in Geneva in July 2020.
WORLD / Science & Health
May 4, 2024

'Get this done,' WHO chief urges pandemic accord talks

World Health Organization member states have spent the last two years drafting an international accord on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.
A Palestinian girl holding a child is silhouetted against the lights of an oncoming car in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on Saturday amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Hamas militant group.
WORLD / Politics
May 5, 2024

Hamas official says group will not accept truce that does not end Gaza war

Qatari, Egyptian and U.S. mediators met a Hamas delegation in Cairo on Saturday in the latest bid to halt the fighting.
A Cambridge research fellow's dismissal is sparking outcry amid a freedom of speech debate about the university's diversity, equality and inclusion policies.
COMMENTARY
May 7, 2024

Will Cambridge support free speech?

Cambridge research fellow's dismissal sparks outcry amid a freedom of speech debate at the university and its diversity, equality and inclusion policies.
Interpreters of the European Parliament in Brussels on April 11
WORLD / Politics
May 8, 2024

Babel in Brussels: The shadow army of EU interpreters

Humming with different languages like a modern-day Tower of Babel, the European Union's institutions are the world's largest employer of interpreters.
A police officer handles money seized during an operation against 'Ndrangheta in this photo taken at an unknown location in Italy on Sept. 6.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
May 8, 2024

Italy's mafia forgoes extortion, turns to white-collar crime

With extortion rackets falling out of fashion and murders largely frowned upon by the godfathers, Italy's mafia is venturing into white-collar crime.
A woman walks past air-conditioning units on a building in Seoul on April 30.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
May 8, 2024

World extends temperature streak to 11 months with hottest April ever

Including April, the world's average temperature was the highest on record for a 12-month period — 1.61 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial period.
Figure skater Shoma Uno announced his retirement in an Instagram post on Thursday.
MORE SPORTS / Figure skating
May 9, 2024

Former two-time figure skating world champion Shoma Uno retires

Uno said his years on the ice had been "wonderful."
Workers make pods for e-cigarettes on the production line at Kanger Tech, one of China's leading manufacturers of vaping products, on Sept. 24, 2019 in Shenzhen, China.
BUSINESS / Markets
May 9, 2024

China’s factory glut alarms the world, but there’s no quick fix

European Union leaders, who are threatening tariffs on electric cars, were the latest to scold China about overcapacity, but there are no plans to change.
Current AI systems, designed to be honest, have developed a troubling skill for deception, from tricking human players in online games of world conquest to hiring humans to solve "prove-you're-not-a-robot" tests, a team of scientists argue in the journal Patterns on Friday.
WORLD / Science & Health
May 11, 2024

AI systems are already deceiving us — and that's a problem, experts warn

Current AI systems have tricked human players in online games and even hired humans to solve "prove-you're-not-a-robot" tests.
Chinese and U.S. flags flutter outside the building of an American company in Beijing.
WORLD / Politics
May 16, 2024

'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger,' China trolls U.S. tariffs

Chinese state media accused the U.S. of taking action that threatens climate goals and will push up costs for American consumers.
Attendees watch a broadcast of the swearing-in ceremony of Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong on Wednesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
May 16, 2024

Singapore’s PM Wong takes office warning of ‘more violent’ world

Lawrence Wong takes office with rising concerns over the cost of living, strained U.S.-China ties and wars in the Middle East and Ukraine.
Internally displaced women wait to collect aid at a camp in Gadaref, Sudan, last Sunday. Clashes reignited between the Sudanese army and rival paramilitaries earlier this week in the key Darfur town of al-Fashir.
WORLD / Politics
May 17, 2024

Residents cower as fighting picks up in Sudan's al-Fashir

The city is the Sudanese army's last stronghold in the western Darfur region.
Ships are seen near a temporary floating pier built to receive humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip in Gaza Beach in this image release on Saturday.
WORLD
May 18, 2024

Fierce fighting in northern Gaza as aid starts to roll off U.S.-built pier

As the fighting raged, the U.S. military said trucks started moving aid ashore from a temporary pier, the first to reach the besieged enclave by sea in weeks.
Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov attends a meeting of Russian President Vladimir Putin with commanders of troops of military districts, in Moscow on May 15.
WORLD / Politics
May 20, 2024

The technocrat who’s taking control of Putin’s war effort

While other technocrats in Russian President Vladimir Putin's orbit privately see his geopolitical moves as problematic, the new defense minister is a true believer.
Kim Do-hoon is set to lead South Korea in World Cup qualifiers against Singapore and China in June.
SOCCER
May 21, 2024

South Korea appoints another interim coach for World Cup qualifiers

Jurgen Klinsmann was sacked in February after his team crashed out in the semifinals of the Asian Cup.
People hold antiwar placards in Madrid during a protest to call for a cease-fire in Gaza on Jan. 20.
WORLD / Politics
May 23, 2024

Israel's isolation deepens as European countries recognize Palestinian state

The move follows warnings by Washington over withholding arms, sanctions against violent settlers and accusations of genocide in international courts.
An Israeli officer directing traffic at the Qalandia checkpoint between Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and Jerusalem on Dec. 3, 2023. Spain, Norway and Ireland said on Wednesday that they would recognize an independent Palestinian state, a rebuke to Israel over its war in Gaza and its decades of occupation of Palestinian territories.
WORLD / Politics
May 23, 2024

Can European recognition bring Palestinian statehood any closer?

The recognition comes as the International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor requests arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his defense minister for alleged war crimes in Gaza.

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past