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Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 23, 2023

LGBTQ+ ‘state of emergency’ is no PR stunt

No, the HRC is not being hyperbolic in its warning about the political climate, the dangers it poses to LGBTQ+ people and what must be done by everyone to change it.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jan 18, 2023

At long last, Japan’s startup scene may finally be ready to take big leap forward

The president of Cambridge Innovation Center Japan is among those feeling bullish that Japan’s startup scene is on the right track, thanks in part to new government initiatives.
Cincinnati Opera’s new production of “Madame Butterfly,” directed by Matthew Ozawa, frames the action as a virtual-reality fantasy of Japan.
CULTURE / Stage
Jul 27, 2023

Reimagining ‘Madame Butterfly,’ with Asian creators at the helm

As opera houses rework Puccini’s classic, criticized for stereotypes about women and Japanese culture, artists of Asian descent are playing a central role.
A screen displays Chinese leader Xi Jinping, at the Military Museum of the Chinese People's Revolution in Beijing last October.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 28, 2023

China eyes accelerated plan for ‘world-class military,’ Japan says

An annual defense white paper said the world was facing its greatest test since World War II amid China's military buildup and the Ukraine war.
Taiwanese singer Chang Hui-mei — also known as "A-Mei" — poses with her mother (second from left) on the red carpet in Taipei in 2016.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Aug 8, 2023

Chinese fans barred from wearing rainbows at gay-friendly show

Being gay, bisexual or transgender is increasingly seen by some in China as a concept imported from the West.
Junior high school students participate in a community-based club activity without any instructors in Kakegawa, Shizuoka Prefecture.
JAPAN / Society / Regional voices: Chubu
Aug 15, 2023

Facing long hours, teacher pushes for data-driven reforms

Given the long working hours for Japan's schoolteachers, one educator from Gifu Prefecture is leading initiatives for teachers’ work-style reforms.
Yellowknife residents leave the city Wednesday on the only highway in or out of the northern Canadian community after an evacuation order was given due to a wildfire.
WORLD
Aug 17, 2023

Evacuation ordered as wildfire threatens town in northern Canada

Yellowknife has a population of around 20,000 people and lies 400 kilometers south of the Arctic circle.
News footage of China's People's Liberation Army military drills around Taiwan in a shopping area of Beijing on Saturday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Aug 20, 2023

Taiwan details China drills as VP says election not China's to call

Taiwan's election next year is a choice between democracy and autocracy, Vice President Lai Ching-te said following the military exercises.
Tourists walk in front of Crown and Anchor pub on Neal Street in London in 2018. Pubs are big part of British culture.
WORLD / Society
Sep 4, 2023

What’s really killing Britain’s historic pubs

With each time-honored spot that’s shuttered, another little piece of British history is lost.
A rainbow at the site of this year’s Burning Man festival in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada
WORLD / Society
Sep 4, 2023

What is Burning Man, and why have Paris Hilton and Elon Musk shown up?

The festival has been described as a site of countercultural revelry that draws both hippies and Silicon Valley types.
Children learn about nature on one of Odyssey's fishing trips in 2022.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET
Sep 6, 2023

After 3/11, an environment education rethink takes shape in Japan

The thinking behind Odyssey is that interacting with nature will foster an ability to think critically about current socioenvironmental issues.
An activist in Seoul protests Japan’s plan to release treated wastewater from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
PODCAST / deep dive
Sep 7, 2023

Anger at Fukushima’s wastewater; hope in its renewables

Good news and bad news out of Fukushima.
The Man effigy looms over the Burning Man encampment after a severe rainstorm left tens of thousands of revelers stranded in mud in the festival's Black Rock City in the Nevada desert.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 8, 2023

Burning Man 2023 is a climate-crisis parable

At first, Burning Man festivalgoers shunned environmental protesters. Then the climate crisis, and extraordinary rains, caught up with them.
If you've ever dined on fresh fish, either within Japan or anywhere else in the world, there's a healthy chance it was processed via ikejime, a Japanese technique for preserving freshness in line-caught fish.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Sep 30, 2023

How the world got hooked on ikejime-caught fish

Roughly rendered in English as “locking in life,” this technique delivers a quick death to ensure freshness.
Teacher Tarna Andrews at the local school grounds, ahead of a nationwide referendum on Indigenous issues, in Areyonga, Australia
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Oct 5, 2023

In Australia's outback, Indigenous proposal struggles to inspire

In just over a week, Australians will vote on a referendum on Indigenous issues. However, the very people it is designed to help know little about it.
Supporters of the "Yes" vote listen to the results of the referendum on whether to officially recognize Australia's Indigenous peoples, at an event in Sydney on Saturday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Oct 15, 2023

Australian Indigenous call for 'week of silence' after vote defeat

More than 60% of Australians voted "No" in the landmark referendum on Saturday in what many see as a setback for reconciliation efforts.
In almost 30 years of fighting wildfire, Art Gonzales has seen blazes grow progressively bigger and stranger.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Oct 20, 2023

‘It’s all-consuming.’ Wildfire whispering is now a year-round job

What was once limited to certain months now encompasses an entire ‘fire year'
They call it Q-Day: the day when a quantum computer, one more powerful than any yet built, could shatter the world of privacy and security as we know it.
WORLD / Science & Health
Oct 23, 2023

The race to save our secrets from the computers of the future

Quantum technology could compromise our encryption systems. Can America replace them before it’s too late?
Inagaki, now 90, says a pivotal trip to the United States in 1969 changed not only his fashion sense from preppy to hippie but also his approach to music.
CULTURE / Music
Oct 27, 2023

Saxophonist Jiro Inagaki’s golden age of jazz rock

“WaJazz Legends: Jiro Inagaki” highlights the musician’s eclectic oeuvre, which has transformed a sidetrack artist into a pillar of Japanese jazz.
If you spot a wild animal in the city, it's likely lost. Still, alert authorities immediately to prevent any unpleasantness.
ENVIRONMENT / Wildlife / Longform
Nov 13, 2023

The concrete forest: Bears, boars and more head to the cities

Warmer winters, less food and an aging society all play a part in why wild animals are increasingly venturing into human-populated areas.
An agent inspects a tree extracted from the Amazon rainforest during an operation to combat deforestation in Para State, Brazil, on Jan. 20.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Nov 14, 2023

Forests key to climate fight along with cutting fossil fuels: study

Restoring global forests could sequester 22 times as much carbon as the world emits in a year, meaning trees are a key tool in fighting climate change.
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.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan speaks at an event in June.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 26, 2023

London’s mayor tries to unite a city divided by war in Gaza

The fighting between Israel and Hamas is shaking Muslim and Jewish people, who have lived side-by-side in London for generations.
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.
Argentina's President-elect Javier Milei has frequently referred to both his study of the Torah — the Jewish scripture that is also the first part of the Christian Bible — and his identity as a Catholic.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 30, 2023

Javier Milei's spirituality: Catholicism, Torah and a 'libertarian' God

Argentine President-elect has offered glimpses into how his seemingly contradictory spiritual practices influence his idiosyncratic worldview.
U.S. President Joe Biden during a meeting in the Oval Office on Thursday
WORLD / Politics
Dec 3, 2023

Muslim Americans face 'Abandon Biden' dilemma — then who?

Opposition from Muslim and Arab American communities could complicate the president's path to an Electoral College victory.
A vehicle from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, is deployed in Naqoura, southern Lebanon, near the border with Israel.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 4, 2023

U.N. peacekeeping is an essential multilateral tool for peace

Ghana hosts a U.N. meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday at which international ministers are expected to strengthen their commitment to peacekeeping.
Shu Kokaji (center) speaks with fellow volunteers on Saturday at Sunlife Plaza, an evacuation center in Nanao, Ishikawa Prefecture. At the facility, he aims to bring people joy in some aspects of evacuee life.
JAPAN
Jan 10, 2024

Noto quake: 'In times of crisis, all we have is each other'

A team from Iwate Prefecture is just one of many grassroots campaigns mobilizing to support quake victims.
Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa (right) met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on her visit to Kyiv on Jan. 7.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 15, 2024

Kamikawa’s surprise visit to Ukraine sent an important signal

As international support for Ukraine's war effort wavers, Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa's visit to Kyiv last week showed that Japan remains a key Kyiv ally.
Rescue workers look for missing people in collapsed houses in the aftermath of the  earthquake that struck Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, and the surrounding areas on Jan. 1.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 30, 2024

No one left behind: Japan needs to work on its multicultural disaster response

The Noto earthquake has put into relief, once again, the need to cater disaster responses and preparedness to everyone, including foreigners.

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