Search - 2000

 
 
In 2024, child mortality for children before the age of 5 reached a record low of 3.6%, down from over 25% in 1950. For most of history, about half of all newborns died as children.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 22, 2025

Even this year is the best time ever to be alive

Another way of looking at it: Every day over the past couple of years, roughly 30,000 people moved out of extreme poverty worldwide.
People walk in front of billboards in a subway station in Shanghai on Jan. 16.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 22, 2025

China's frugal young adults accelerate saving, raising economic risks

Some economists warn entrenched saving could hollow out demand just as policymakers are counting on domestic consumption to bolster China's GDP.
The day care room for younger children at a multipurpose facility on Tonaki Island, Okinawa Prefecture, has never been used since its establishment in 2019.
JAPAN / Society / Regional Voices: Okinawa
Feb 3, 2025

The harsh reality of migration outflow on Okinawa’s least populated island

Since Tonaki Island established its only day care center in 2019, not a single child has set foot inside.
Japanese Communist Party leader Tomoko Tamura speaks at a Lower House session in Tokyo in December 2024.
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 23, 2025

Japanese Communist Party's Tomoko Tamura faces leadership questions ahead of polls

Tamura is aiming for 6.5 million proportional representation votes, but experts say that's unrealistic.
Schoolchildren in El Bosque, Mexico. Education is one of the services most frequently disrupted by climate hazards, UNICEF's executive director Catherine Russell said.
WORLD / Society
Jan 24, 2025

Climate shocks in 2024 disrupted 242 million children's schooling: UNICEF

Heat waves had the biggest impact, with at least 171 million children affected by them last year.
Rodgers (right) was a longtime managing editor of Kyoto Journal and, alongside colleagues like Susan Pavloska (left) and John Einarsen (center), helped make it one of Japan’s leading English-language publications.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Jan 27, 2025

Ken Rodgers, a fixture of the Kyoto literary scene, dies at 72

Hailing from Australia, Rodgers made a home and community for himself in Japan’s ancient capital across more than four decades.
A U.S. district judge did little to hide that he was highly skeptical of Donald Trump's executive order limiting birthright citizenship.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 27, 2025

Judge scoffs at legality of Trump’s bid to limit birthright citizenship

"This is a blatantly unconstitutional order,” the judge said of Donald Trump's executive order.
People line up to use an ATM  in the separatist-controlled city of Donetsk, Ukraine, days after Russian President Vladimir Putin authorized the full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022. Western financial sanctions have weighed on the Russian ruble, which has sunk from 34 to the dollar in 2013 to around 100 today.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 27, 2025

Putin’s war is fueling Russian stagflation

For a normal country, a budget deficit of 2% of GDP would be of no concern. But Russia is not a normal country.
Former U.S. figure skaters Dick Button and Tenley Albright are introduced during an exhibition event after the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Boston in January 2014.
MORE SPORTS / Figure skating
Jan 31, 2025

U.S. figure skating great Dick Button dies at 95

Long before he became known for his on-air observations, Button dominated the figure skating world with his athleticism.
The front page of The Japan Times on Feb. 21, 1925, carried news of clashes in the streets over the debate of extending voting rights to Japanese males over the age of 25.
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Feb 1, 2025

Japan Times 1925: Tokyo factions ready to fight over manhood suffrage bill in Diet

Objections from the country's 1% came as Japan debated extending voting rights to all men over the age of 25.
German President Horst Koehler makes a speech at an event in Leipzig on Oct. 9, 2009.
WORLD / Politics
Feb 1, 2025

Horst Koehler, former German president and IMF chief, dies at 81

Despite being a largely unknown figure before assuming the presidency, Koehler quickly proved himself in opinion polls to be one of Germany's most popular political figures.
Vehicles parked at a General Motors complex in Silao, Guanajuato state, Mexico
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 3, 2025

Car prices face $3,000 increase in U.S. as tariffs hit auto sector

The tariffs are set to take effect at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday, giving manufacturers less than 48 hours to figure out what to do.
Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte speaks during a news conference at her office in Manila in December.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Feb 6, 2025

Philippine lower house impeaches Vice President Sara Duterte

The impeachment stemmed from a number of allegations, with Duterte having repeatedly denied wrongdoing.
Ditching the U.S.' normal trade relations designation for China could lead to an automatic jump in levies, at rates that could far exceed what Trump has so far slapped on China.
BUSINESS / Economy / ANALYSIS
Feb 6, 2025

Trump's China focus increases odds of end to special trading status

The Permanent Normal Trade Relations designation was was extended to China in 2000.
Russian Communist Party supporters carry a flag after a ceremony in Moscow to mark the 150th anniversary of Vladimir Lenin's birth in 2020.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 10, 2025

Russia’s nostalgia machine works for strongman Putin

If Russians are gripped by a yearning for an imaginary past, they will not fight for a better future.
North Koreans on a bus hold the hands of their South Korean relatives as they bid farewell at the end of a three-day family reunion event at North Korea's Mount Kumgang resort in August 2018.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Feb 13, 2025

North Korea demolishing family reunion center, Seoul says

The meetings had been subject to the vagaries of inter-Korea politics and often used as a negotiating tool by Pyongyang.
A Ukrainian serviceman watches an inspection of damage to the radiation containment shield of Reactor 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant following a Russian drone strike in Chernobyl, Ukraine, on Friday.
WORLD
Feb 15, 2025

Russian drone attack 'damaged Chernobyl plant's confinement structure'

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the International Atomic Energy Agency had earlier reported that radiation levels remained normal at the plant.
Tokyo Koon stands at the forefront of tackling the so-called 2025 issue, also known as the “Magnetic Tape Alert.”
JAPAN / Society / Longform
Feb 17, 2025

The race to save 20th-century history

Analog recordings are at risk of disappearing as old tech breaks down and spare parts run out.
Karlheinz Rabas, an 87-year-old historian, in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, on Jan. 16
WORLD / Politics
Feb 18, 2025

German voters demand change as Europe's biggest economy stalls

A constitutional debt brake has prevented successive governments from making vital investments needed to overhaul Germany's ailing economic model.
Director Park Chan-wook (center) and his cast hit commercial gold with “Joint Security Area,” a film about North and South Korean friendship.
CULTURE / Film
Feb 18, 2025

South Korean blockbuster 'Joint Security Area' strikes a chord 25 years on

Park Chan-wook's tale of inter-Korean friendship was a risky undertaking at the time of filming, but it has since become a celebrated cinematic masterpiece.
Once a boon to tea farmers' bottom lines, the global matcha craze is now pushing producers and distributors to their limits with few options to adequately meet demand.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Feb 23, 2025

Japan struggles to fend off a world without enough matcha

Production methods and economic risks keep the domestic tea industry from ramping up supply.
The drop in domestic shipments of paper and paperboard in 2024 came as newspaper publishers ended evening editions and the trend of reducing paper use in offices continued.
BUSINESS
Feb 21, 2025

Japan's domestic paper shipments hit 39-year low in 2024

The drop came as newspaper publishers ended evening editions and the trend of reducing paper use in offices continued.
Mourners walk during the funeral procession with the vehicle carrying the coffins of Hezbollah's slain leaders Hassan Nasrallah and Hashem Safieddine toward their burial place on the outskirts of Beirut on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Feb 24, 2025

Hezbollah chief vows 'resistance' as masses mourn Nasrallah

Naim Qassem, the successor of the slain Hezbollah chief, promised to keep following his "path," and rejected any control by the "tyrant America" over Lebanon.
Germany’s new leader, Friedrich Merz, aims to revive the economy with tax cuts and pro-business reforms, but an aging population, labor shortages and rising social costs may limit growth and strain public finances.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 25, 2025

Germany needs an economic miracle. Merz's odds don’t look good.

Merz faces an aging population that’s set to hold back growth and exacerbate strains on the federal budget and social security system.
Chef Kentaro Mura’s favorite way of serving snow crab is as shabu-shabu: The legs are lightly blanched in dashi, then the meat is removed and served with a generous scoop of crab tomalley.
LIFE / Food & Drink / Destination Restaurants
Mar 2, 2025

Toyama’s finest seafood underpins Ebitei Bekkan’s return to greatness

This "kaiseki" restaurant has been making up for lost time with a culinary flair that presents Toyama’s seafood tradition in a contemporary guise.
A sign directs people to a measles testing center in Gaines County, Texas, on Tuesday. A measles outbreak in West Texas and New Mexico is sparking fears of worsening public health crisis in the United States. 
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 27, 2025

Texas measles outbreak was entirely avoidable

"It’s more contagious than COVID, more contagious than the flu, more contagious than Ebola,” says Paul Offit, of Philadelphia's Vaccine Education Center.
On March 21, 1925, a front page headline announced that the Tokyo Radio Broadcasting Bureau, the precursor to NHK, had begun operations with a communications range of 50 kilometers.
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Mar 1, 2025

Japan Times 1925: Government sanctions official broadcasting station, the precursor to NHK

Japan’s first official broadcasting station began operating 100 years ago, setting a new precedent for the speed of communication and news.
Shinsuke Kimura, head of the Recovery Support Center, talks about the group's activities during an interview in Tokyo last week.
JAPAN
Mar 3, 2025

Nonprofit supporting victims of 1995 Tokyo sarin attack to disband

The Recovery Support Center was created as many victims complained of problems with their eyes even years after medical examinations began to be offered.
Ayako Sono
JAPAN
Mar 4, 2025

Japanese writer Ayako Sono dies at 93

Renowned Japanese writer Ayako Sono, known for many best-selling novels and essays, died of natural causes at a Tokyo hospital. She was 93.
A video board highlights LeBron James' 50,000 career point milestone after the Lakers forward scored a three point basket against the Pelicans in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
BASKETBALL / NBA
Mar 5, 2025

LeBron James becomes first NBA player to score 50,000 total points

James has shown no sign of slowing down in his 22nd season in the league.

Longform

Growing families are being priced out of Tokyo’s condo market, forced to choose between downtown convenience and suburban space.
Is living in central Tokyo still affordable?