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Balboa Port, operated by Panama Ports Company, at the Panama Canal. Conglomerate CK Hutchison, controlled by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, has agreed to sell its ports network, including assets along the Panama Canal, to a U.S. consortium led by BlackRock.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics / ANALYSIS
Mar 7, 2025

As Trump hails taking back of Panama Canal, Hong Kong Inc. walks tightrope

Firms in the former British colony are increasingly under pressure to shake off any connection with China amid tensions between Beijing and Washington.
Rintaro Sekizuka runs a record store in both London and Tokyo’s Katsushika Ward.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Mar 8, 2025

Tokyo’s vinyl experts say overseas buyers are ‘sustaining the scene’

A weak yen makes rare vinyls a steal for tourists, and locals say it's all part of a circular musical exchange.
While Google may be the restaurant review medium of choice in other countries, Japan largely prefers Tabelog, where five-star reviews are rare and three-star reviews aren't what they seem.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Mar 9, 2025

On Japan's top foodie site, imperfection is gold

Cultural expectations may influence ratings on Tabelog, but reading between the lines might help you find the next hidden gem.
Bar Bota, the 37th-floor watering hole at the Four Seasons Osaka, looks out on a glittering cityscape better known for its cheap eats and drinks.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Mar 9, 2025

Slowly but surely, Osaka emerges from Kyoto’s fine-dining shadow

The majority of tourists go to Osaka with street food on their minds, but the city is rapidly improve its elevated dining options as well.
“The Place of Shells” takes place mostly in Gottingen, Germany, where both the author and the book's narrator live, while also jumping both geographically and temporally to Sendai, Japan, through memories of the 3/11 disaster and its aftermath.
CULTURE / Books
Mar 10, 2025

Grief ebbs and flows between two tragedies in 'The Place of Shells'

Mai Ishizawa’s debut novel, which won one of the three Akutagawa Prizes awarded in 2021, is also her first to be released in English, translated by Polly Barton.
Hiromi Okuda’s study abroad experience at the University of Mumbai inspired her to build a career at the intersection of social welfare and IT.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / 20 QUESTIONS
Mar 7, 2025

Hiromi Okuda: 'Humans and emerging tech should exist symbiotically'

For the past 30 years, Hiromi Okuda has forged a career at the intersection of social welfare and technology.
Supporters of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold placards showing a picture of Yoon during a rally near the Constitutional Court in Seoul on Feb. 25.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Mar 7, 2025

South Korean court says Yoon can leave jail

The Seoul Central District Court accepted Yoon’s complaint against his arrest, it said Friday in a text message.
The illuminated advertising board of a host club in Tokyo's Kabukicho entertainment district. The bill approved by the government on Friday aims to ban hosts from emotionally manipulating customers into making excessive purchases — a common tactic in the industry.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 7, 2025

Japan looks to crack down on host club exploitation with tighter regulations

Police received 2,776 consultations nationwide related to host clubs last year, with many involving women coerced into sex work to cover unpaid bills.
Shizuko Nishio — who will turn 86 on March 10, when Japan will commemorate 80 years after the bombing of Tokyo — gives an explanation in February in front of a map showing the areas that were burned in the air raids.
JAPAN
Mar 7, 2025

'Eerie' sky, charred bodies: 80 years since Tokyo's World War II firestorm

Because of the atomic bombings and Japan's surrender a month later, the firebombing of Tokyo is often overlooked in history.
Ichiko Aoba’s latest full-length album, “Luminescent Creatures,” weaves in sounds mimicking whale songs and wind to express her fascination with the natural world and its interconnectedness.
CULTURE / Music
Mar 7, 2025

Ichiko Aoba’s intimate sonic fantasy born from dreams

The singer-songwriter turns her subconscious into songs about the natural world and its interconnectedness on “Luminescent Creatures.”
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 7, 2025

Bank of America CEO willing to hire in Japan amid revival

The bank, based in Charlotte, North Carolina, has about 800 employees in Japan.
Actress Mana Ashida during a news conference in Tokyo on Thursday. The U.N. Development Program has picked Ashida as domestic goodwill ambassador for Japan.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Mar 7, 2025

Japan actress Mana Ashida named UNDP goodwill ambassador

Ashida will be in charge of promotional activities in Japan mainly related to the fight against climate change and other environmental challenges.
Elon Musk departs the White House for the Capitol on the night of U.S. President Donald Trump's address to a joint session of Congress, in Washington, on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 8, 2025

Inside the explosive meeting where Trump officials clashed with Elon Musk

Simmering anger at the billionaire’s unchecked power spilled out in a remarkable Cabinet Room meeting. The president quickly moved to rein in Musk.
Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan leader Yoshihiko Noda addresses a rally calling for the introduction of a system allowing married couples to choose whether to use the same or different family names on Feb. 26 at parliament.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 8, 2025

Some 44% of Japanese lawmakers back selective dual surname system

The figure far outstrips the 1% who said that the country should maintain its current same surname system.
Qianmen street, Beijing, in March 2023. Though the immediate shock has passed, COVID-19's legacy continues to reshape global economies and markets.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 8, 2025

Five years on, the economic impact of COVID-19 lingers

Though the immediate shock has passed, COVID-19's legacy continues to reshape global economies and markets.
A makeshift memorial for fallen Ukrainian soldiers on Independence Square in Kyiv.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 8, 2025

Ten days that shook Ukraine’s world reverberate in defiant Kyiv

The U.S. shift is as calamitous for Ukraine as it is shocking for European allies. But the mood remains defiant in Kyiv.
Shigeru Ishiba, the prime minister and president of the Liberal Democratic Party, shakes hands with one of the party's candidates for the upcoming Upper House election during the party's annual convention in Tokyo on Sunday.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 10, 2025

Ishiba vows all-out election fight at LDP convention

The triennial Upper House election comes after the LDP-Komeito ruling coalition lost its majority in the Lower House in last year's general election.
Cyclone Alfred weakened into a tropical depression Saturday as it neared the rain and wind-lashed eastern coast of Australia where hundreds of thousands of properties were without power.
ASIA PACIFIC
Mar 9, 2025

Wild weather leaves mass blackouts in Australia

Wild weather has blacked out more than 300,000 homes and businesses on Australia's east coast, officials said Sunday.
Personal items that were collected after the Great East Japan Earthquake in March 2011 are on display at a facility in the city of Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture.
JAPAN
Mar 9, 2025

Municipalities to end storage of personal items collected after 3/11

When asked what is needed to continue storing collected personal items, 16 municipalities cited the need for storage and display space, while 10 mentioned budget constraints.
The massive wildfire that broke out in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, on Feb. 26 has been contained, the city declared Sunday.
JAPAN
Mar 9, 2025

Massive Iwate wildfire, the nation's largest in half a century, is contained

The wildfire engulfed about 2,900 hectares — around half the size of Manhattan — making it Japan's largest in more than 50 years.
Syrian army personnel gather as they head toward Latakia to join the fight against the fighters linked to Syria's ousted leader Bashar Assad, in Aleppo, Syria, on Friday.
WORLD
Mar 10, 2025

Syrian leader scrambles to contain deadliest violence in years

Clashes that a war monitoring group said had already killed over 1,000 people in Syria continued for a fourth day.
Aizawa Concrete employees work in the Namie factory in Fukushima Prefecture in January.
BUSINESS / FOCUS
Mar 11, 2025

14 years after 3/11 disasters, Fukushima vies to become a startup hub

Part of the goal is to attract a more permanent workforce to Fukushima to support the development of the prefecture as a whole.
A solar panel provides electricity in northern Gaza on Feb. 13. Israel’s energy minister said on Sunday that he was immediately cutting off electricity to the Gaza Strip as Israel tries to pressure Hamas amid talks over their fragile truce.
WORLD
Mar 10, 2025

Israel halts Gaza's electricity supply ahead of new truce talks

Israel's decision comes a week after it blocked all aid supplies to Gaza.
People walk past an agency building of the Chinese electric car brand BYD in Mexico City on March 3.
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 10, 2025

Tesla is flailing in China and the rapid rise of BYD is to blame

Disappointing shipments in China have been blamed on a narrow and dated lineup, particularly in the face of up-to-date and more exciting offerings from BYD and others.
Jewish settlers pray in the Evyatar settler outpost in the northern West Bank last July
WORLD / Politics
Mar 10, 2025

Christians press Trump to clear path for Israel to annex West Bank

Some 80% of white, evangelical Christians voted for President Trump. Now, some want a policy change that could undermine a future Palestinian state.
Excavators to be used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to remove debris from homes destroyed by the Eaton Fire in Altadena, California
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / FOCUS
Mar 10, 2025

Cascading extreme weather events unleash billions in damages globally

Compound weather, when two or more concurrent events that collectively yield a result worse than if each had occurred on its own, are occurring more frequently.
The Ukedo Elementary School Ruins in Namie, Fukushima Prefecture, in January. The Fukushima Prefectural Government offers training sessions for new prefectural government recruits to visit the school, the prefecture's sole preserved disaster-hit structure.
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2025

14 years on, prefectural governments work to pass on lessons to new hires

Many prefectural officials who were involved in front-line operations in the immediate aftermath of the massive earthquake and tsunami are retiring.
Mayor Jin Sato attends the unveiling ceremony of the monument, which inscribes the names of 37 town officials who died while working on response to the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami, on Sunday in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture.
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2025

Monument erected in Miyagi to remember officials who died in March 2011

The monument is inscribed with the words, "We will never forget that day."
Crown Prince Akishino and Crown Princess Kiko attend a memorial service in Tokyo's Sumida Ward on Monday to mourn the estimated 100,000 victims of the U.S. military's air raid on Tokyo 80 years ago.
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2025

Crown Prince Akishino joins in mourning victims of the 1945 Tokyo air raid

An estimated 100,000 people died on March 10, 1945, after about 300 U.S. B-29 bombers dropped bombs on Tokyo.
Artificial intelligence is set to disrupt white-collar jobs, making it crucial for knowledge workers to embrace AI, develop backup plans and adapt to an evolving job market.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 10, 2025

How to hedge against AI stealing your job

"Knowledge workers" need a back-up plan as artificial intelligence keeps getting better.

Longform

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.
What comes after 100?