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In this handout picture released by Kazakhstan's emergency situations ministry, emergency specialists work at the crash site of an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger jet near the western Kazakh city of Aktau on Dec. 25.
WORLD
Dec 26, 2024

Azerbaijan Airlines plane crashes in Kazakhstan, killing 38

A jet crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, killing 38 people.
A rescuer of the State Emergency Service works to put out a fire in a private house after a drone strike in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Wednesday.
WORLD
Dec 26, 2024

Russia launches 'inhuman' Christmas Day attacks, Ukraine says

Half a million people in the Kharkiv region were left without heating, in temperatures just a few degrees Celsius above zero.
People use their smartphones as they sit on motorbikes in Ho Chi Minh City on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Dec 26, 2024

Sweeping Vietnam internet law comes into force

Under a new law, all tech giants operating in Vietnam must verify users' accounts via their phone numbers or Vietnamese identification numbers.
The silhouettes of a military vehicle and a soldier are seen near the Gaza border on Dec. 16.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 26, 2024

Hamas and Israel blame each other for Gaza cease-fire delay

Hamas said Israel laid down further conditions, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the group of going back on understandings already reached.
The hands of dyeing craftsman Yoshiharu Okamoto are stained a deep blue by his work with indigo.
LIFE / Style & Design
Dec 26, 2024

True blue tradition: How Japan's coveted jeans are made

Craftspeople in Okayama Prefecture are carrying on a centuries-old tradition of indigo dyeing that contrasts with contemporary fast fashion.
International students and others participate in a disaster preparedness drill in Osaka City, where disaster information was conveyed in foreign languages.
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2024

Noto quake inspires more focus on getting disaster info to non-Japanese

The earthquake that struck the Noto Peninsula on Jan. 1 highlighted the need to help foreign nationals who do not speak Japanese be more informed.
Emergency specialists work at the crash site of an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger plane near the city of Aktau, Kazakhstan, on Wednesday.
WORLD
Dec 27, 2024

Russian air defenses downed Azerbaijan Airlines flight, sources say

Flight J2-8243 crashed on Wednesday in a ball of fire near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan after diverting from an area of southern Russia.
Spanish Red Cross members hold children after a boat with 57 migrants onboard arrived at La Restinga port on the Canary island of El Hierro, on Sept. 14.
WORLD / Society
Dec 27, 2024

Record number of migrants lost at sea were bound for Spain in 2024: NGO

An average of 30 people died per day while trying to reach Spain by sea in 2024, up from around 18 in 2023.
The central Hokkaido city of Asahikawa made headlines this year when one of its suburbs was named as the best place to live in Japan — a ranking earned in part due to the community's many outstanding restaurants and cafes.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Dec 28, 2024

How Hokkaido quietly became a culinary treasure trove in 2024

Food trucks, morsels with cutesy cues from nature and more helped Japan’s northernmost island have a stellar year.
Guatemalan migrants walk after arriving at La Aurora Air Force Base on a deportation flight from the U.S., in Guatemala City, Guatemala, on Nov. 8.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 27, 2024

Guatemala open to accepting Trump's Central American deportees: sources

Guatemala has been particularly proactive in preparing for a second Donald Trump term relative to neighbors El Salvador and Honduras.
Smoke rises after Israeli strikes near Sanaa airport, in Sanaa, Yemen, on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 27, 2024

Israel hits Houthis in Yemen in response to slow escalation

Among targets hit Thursday included military infrastructure at the Sanaa International Airport and in the Hezyaz and Ras Kanatib power stations.
Takahiro Funamoto, deputy facility manager of elderly care facility Hyakuju-en in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, at the damaged facility building on Dec. 5
JAPAN
Dec 27, 2024

Link probed between elderly deaths and Noto earthquake evacuations

Many local facilities including hospitals were left dysfunctional due to power and water outages and building damage.
South Korea's ruling People Power Party lawmakers (bottom) argue to National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-shik (second right top) during the plenary session for the impeachment vote of acting president Han Duck-soo at the National Assembly in Seoul on Friday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 27, 2024

South Korea's parliament impeaches acting president Han Duck-soo

The move plunged the country deeper into political chaos, as the Constitutional Court also said it would swiftly trial suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol.
Black American women, who still heavily vote for the Democratic Party, are taking a much-needed break from political engagement after the last election, with the idea that rest and renewal will prepare them for future activism.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 27, 2024

Temporarily disconnected from politics? Feel no guilt about it.

Opposition movements are a recurring feature of American politics and predicts a robust, reenergized response when the time comes.
The next 12 months will be more challenging, with some countries pursuing quick interest-rate cuts while others will proceed cautiously.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 27, 2024

A view to 2025: Enough with the central bank hawks and doves

Interest-rate cuts will be a feature, including at institutions that resisted easing in 2024. But mind the nuances.
A bear trap in Hokkaido Prefecture. Bears have recently been found inside homes and shops.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 27, 2024

Increasing number of Japanese bears find human dwellings ‘just right’

Cases of bears making their way into homes and shops are on the rise across the country as the animal's natural food sources become scarce.
Members of the Self-Defense Forces stand in formation at Camp Asaka on Nov. 9.
JAPAN
Dec 27, 2024

Japan uncovers 100 new cases of mishandled security secrets at SDF

The ministry has been conducting investigations after many rule violations related to the handling of secrets were found earlier this year.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba speaks during a meeting in Tokyo on Friday.
JAPAN / Politics
Dec 28, 2024

Ishiba hints at possibility of double election next summer

An Upper House poll is scheduled for next July, and Ishiba hinted at the possibility that a Lower House election might coincide with that poll.
Cats sit on steps at Grazing Plains Farm in Newton, Kansas, in May. Researchers are keeping a close eye on the mounting cases of bird flu infections in cats.
WORLD / Science & Health
Dec 28, 2024

New bird flu mutation discovered in U.S. as cat infections cause alarm

Several experts cautioned that it was too early to determine whether these changes would make the virus more transmissible or more severe in people.
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus speaks during a news conference in Kigali, Rwanda, in October.
WORLD
Dec 28, 2024

WHO chief says he narrowly escaped death in Israeli strikes on Yemen airport

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told BBC radio his ears were still ringing following Thursday's attack.
Rescue personnel are seen near the tail section of a Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 series aircraft after the plane crashed and burst into flames at Muan International Airport in Muan, South Korea, on Sunday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Dec 29, 2024

South Korea's worst plane crash in decades leaves 179 dead

Investigators are looking into bird strikes and weather conditions as possible factors in the crash of the Jeju Air plane.
Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a Security Council meeting via videoconference in Moscow on Saturday.
WORLD
Dec 29, 2024

Russia's Putin apologizes to Azerbaijan over 'tragic' airliner crash

Four sources with knowledge of the preliminary findings of Azerbaijan's investigation said that Russian air defenses had mistakenly shot the airliner down.
Rohingya refugees Shamshida (left), who had to flee one of the last refuges in Myanmar for the Rohingya Muslim minority, and her sister Manwara in their tent in Teknaf, Bangladesh, on Nov. 5
ASIA PACIFIC
Dec 29, 2024

For the Rohingya, tormentors change but not the torment

This violence was not at the hands of the military, though. Instead, it was from a pro-democracy rebel group that was raised to fight the army.
As an adult member of the Imperial Family, Princess Kako has performed various official duties at home and abroad this year.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 29, 2024

Japanese Princess Kako turns 30

As an adult member of the Imperial Family, Princess Kako has performed various official duties at home and abroad this year.
Lacquerware maker Takaho Shoji is trying to bring life back to his remote community in the city of Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, after a devastating earthquake and subsequent floods on New Year's Day of 2024.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 29, 2024

Japan's Wajima craftmakers see hope in disaster-hit region

Lacquerware makers are determined to bring life back to the remote community after a devastating New Year's Day earthquake, followed by severe floods.
A woman receives a COVID-19 vaccine in Minato Ward, Tokyo, in October.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Dec 29, 2024

Meiji Seika Pharma files suit against lawmaker over 'unfounded' vaccine claims

CDP Lower House lawmaker Kazuhiro Haraguchi has said that the drugmaker's replicon vaccine is "akin to a biological weapon."
Former U.S. President Jimmy in 1996. Carter, who rose from Georgia farmland to become the 39th president of the United States on a promise of national healing after the wounds of Watergate and Vietnam, then lost the White House in a cauldron of economic turmoil at home and crisis in Iran, died on Sunday at his home in Plains, Georgia. He was 100.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 30, 2024

Jimmy Carter, president known as a peacemaker, is dead at 100

While Carter's presidency was remembered more for its failures than for its successes, his post-presidency was seen by many as a model for future chief executives.
Firefighters on Monday inspect the wreckage of a Jeju Air plane that crashed at Muan International Airport in Muan, South Korea, a day earlier.
ASIA PACIFIC
Dec 30, 2024

South Korea orders air safety probe after worst-ever crash kills 179

Acting President Choi Sang-mok ordered an emergency safety inspection of the country's entire airline operation system as authorities hunted for clues to the crash's cause.
According to the National Police Agency, a total of 3,326 romance scam were reported in the first 11 months of this year, more than double that in the same period of last year.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Dec 30, 2024

'For our future together': The rising threat of romance scams in Japan

The prevalence of such scams, which prey on the lonely, has led authorities to step up measures to crack down on scammers who are often not even in the country.
Mikheil Kavelashvili, elected by lawmakers as Georgia's new president, takes an oath during his swearing-in ceremony at the parliament in Tbilisi on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 30, 2024

New Georgian president sworn in; predecessor calls him illegitimate leader

The presidential standoff is seen as a watershed moment in Georgia, which had been regarded as among the most pro-Western of the former Soviet states.

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years