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Novak Djokovic plays a forehand return to Flavio Cobolli during their Wimbledon quarterfinal match on Wednesday.
TENNIS
Jul 10, 2025

History-chasing Djokovic sets up Wimbledon showdown with Sinner

In the women's draw, five-time Grand Slam winner Iga Swiatek and former Olympic champion Belinda Bencic both reached the semi-finals for the first time.
The Punjab Kings' Josh Inglis competes in the final of the Indian Premier League on June 3 in Ahmedabad.
MORE SPORTS / Cricket
Jul 10, 2025

Cricket's Indian Premier League value surges to $18.5 billion: report

The world's richest cricket tournament has been estimated to generate more than $11 billion a year for the Indian economy.
After nearly shuttering earlier this year, the Tokyo-based Game Preservation Society continues its work to save the early history of Japanese gaming.
LIFE / Digital
Jul 12, 2025

‘Our ultimate goal is to save every single Japanese video game’

The Tokyo-based Game Preservation Society almost shuttered earlier this year, but a flood of support has buoyed efforts to save games on extinct media.
Chinese Finance Minister Lan Fo'an speaks at the China Development Forum 2024 in Beijing in March 2024.
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Jul 11, 2025

Can China become a defender of free trade?

The trillion-dollar question is: Does Beijing’s rhetoric match reality and how sincere is China when it claims to be a “defender” of free trade?
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio attends the East Asia Summit foreign ministers’ meeting in Kuala Lumpur on Friday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jul 12, 2025

Trump tariffs not broached in two ASEAN-related meetings with U.S. officials

The lack of any mention of trade concerns was glaring amid reports that countries are looking at diversifying partnerships as a way to weather U.S. tariffs.
"The odds are high that the U.S. and Japan can come to an agreement," former U.S. Ambassador to Japan William Hagerty said.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 15, 2025

Ex-U.S. envoy William Hagerty optimistic about tariff talks with Japan

"The odds are high that the U.S. and Japan can come to an agreement," Hagerty said in an interview.
Scottie Scheffler speaks during a news conference in Portrush, Northern Ireland, on Tuesday ahead of the British Open.
MORE SPORTS / Golf
Jul 16, 2025

'What's the point?' Scheffler says in candid talk ahead of British Open

When asked how long he celebrates his victories, an introspective Scheffler veered off into questioning what was even the point of being the best golfer in the world.
A woman takes a picture of the poster for the new Hayao Miyazaki film, “The Boy and the Heron.”
PODCAST / deep dive
Aug 2, 2023

Hayao Miyazaki’s confusing new masterpiece

Our critics Thu-Huong Ha and Matt Schley discuss what they thought of the new Hayao Miyazaki film, “The Boy and the Heron.”
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and the chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, attend a document signing ceremony during the Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi, Russia, in October 2019.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 2, 2023

China’s weaponization of race and history

BRICS nations seek a more equitable global architecture that represents the interests of the Global South as China uses race to challenge the West.
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2023

Nuke ban treaty still out of reach as Japan marks atomic bombings

Japan, which is positioned under the "nuclear umbrella" of the U.S., has refrained from joining the treaty, citing its own “tough security environment.”
Spanish midfielder Alexia Putellas (left) battles for the ball against English forward Lauren James during in the final of the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup in Sydney on Sunday. Spain won the match 1-0.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 22, 2023

FIFA boss should read the pitch on women’s pay

More than 2 billion people are expected to have tuned in. About 2 million attended matches in person. Both records. The FIFA Women’s World Cup generated more than $570 million to break even.
U.S. President Joe Biden addresses the nation about the war in Israel and Ukraine from the Oval Office of the White House on Thursday.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 24, 2023

New mantra for U.S. diplomacy: First, do no harm

U.S. power has diminished and the overweening advantage it enjoyed after World War II, even at the end of the Cold War, has dissipated.
Gold medalist Noah Lyles of the U.S. celebrates after the men's 200m final at the World Athletics Championship in Budapest on Aug. 25.
MORE SPORTS / Athletics
Dec 12, 2023

Lyles and Kipyegon named track athletes of the year

Lyles was recognized for the three gold medals he won at the world championships in Budapest.
U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Woodside, California, in November. After another year marked by great-power rivalries and rising security risks, the role of hegemonic, middling and rising powers has become more fluid than at any time since the end of the Cold War.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 4, 2024

The shape of power in 2024

Thinkers ponder whether the coming year will confirm that the world is quickly moving toward greater multipolarity or “nonalignment.”
China's Olympic gold-medal winning 4 x 200 meter freestyle relay team celebrates on the podium at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre on July 29, 2021.  Zhang Yufei (third from left) is among 23 top Chinese swimmers who tested positive for a banned substance in the lead up to the Games.
OLYMPICS
Apr 20, 2024

Top Chinese swimmers tested positive for banned drug, then won Olympic gold

The episode sharply divided the anti-doping world, where China’s record has long been a flashpoint.
Toshihiro Kinjo (center), a research support technician at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, inspects an audio recording device in Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture, on April 3 as Masako Ogasawara, a research support specialist at OIST, looks on.
PODCAST / deep dive
May 23, 2024

What does climate change sound like in Okinawa?

This week, Japan Times climate editor Chris Russell joins us to discuss what researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology are listening to.
The U.S. will no longer view itself through the lens of exceptionalism, regardless of whether Donald Trump or Joe Biden wins the next election.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 24, 2024

American exceptionalism is dead no matter who wins the election

The U.S. will no longer view itself through the lens of exceptionalism regardless of the presidential election's outcome, focusing instead on its narrow self-interests.
Rim Nakamura, who is attempting to win Japan's first Olympic gold medal in cycling, will be one of the top Japanese athletes to watch at the Paris Games.
OLYMPICS
Jul 26, 2024

The Japanese Olympians looking to shine in Paris

Team Japan is looking to build on the momentum from three years ago in Tokyo, where the nation earned a record medal haul.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World / The Year Ahead
Jan 5, 2025

'Guernica' is always with us

How do we account for the past year, almost nine decades after "Guernica," when all the boundaries of horror have been pulverized?
A woman who was displaced by a flood shells cowpeas as she sits outside her shelter in Banki, in Maiduguri, Nigeria, in October.
COMMENTARY / World / The Year Ahead
Jan 6, 2025

The uphill battle against poverty

After the pandemic years, when tens of millions of people were pushed into poverty, the need for a renewed effort is obvious.
Those who lived in Japan’s Nara Period, which lasted from the year 710 to 794, by and large knew themselves to be blessed. It wasn’t just those in power who felt it, either. From nobles to commoners, the poets seemed to have democratized joy itself.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Jan 17, 2025

From Genji to 'hikikomori,' how we make peace with disappearing

Japan’s reverence for impermanence reveals a profound connection between beauty and loss, from poetic musings to spiritual retreats, echoing in modern expressions of solitude.
The international system led by the United Nations faces challenges such as failing to maintain peace, end corruption and implement reforms, raising concerns of a League of Nations-like collapse.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 4, 2025

Transitioning to a new global structure without a League of Nations-style collapse

Like many idealistic efforts throughout history, the League of Nations teetered for years before its final collapse as the end of World War II.
Kotoba Slam Japan runs regional competitions to select a representative for the annual World Poetry Slam Championship, which will take place in Mexico at the end of the month.
CULTURE / Stage
May 9, 2025

Japan’s slam poetry scene is all about raw vulnerability

Slam poetry is a rarity in Japan, but the scene is full of energy and potential that the poets have been bringing to the world slam poetry stage for 10 years now.
Hong Kong-based crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, World Liberty Financial co-founder Zach Witkoff and Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization Eric Trump attend the TOKEN2049 conference in Dubai on May 1.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jul 14, 2025

Trump's $100 million crypto mystery man

A venture calling itself Aqua 1 Foundation announced last month it had bought $100 million worth of U.S. President Donald Trump’s World Liberty crypto tokens.

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