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EDITORIALS
May 23, 2017

Iran's Rouhani wins a second term

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is no Western-style liberal but he understands that Iran's best hope rests on reintegration into the region and the world.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
May 23, 2017

Symantec says 'highly likely' North Korea group behind 'WannaCry' ransomware attacks

Cybersecurity firm Symantec Corp. said on Monday it was "highly likely" a hacking group affiliated with North Korea was behind the "WannaCry" cyberattack this month that infected more than 300,000 computers worldwide and disrupted hospitals, banks and schools across the globe.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
May 21, 2017

Blasting the past with a new vision of future fashion

Much has been made of the recent closure of the monthly print edition of Shoichi Aoki's seminal Fruits street-style magazine, with many ready to cry that it sounds the death knell for Harajuku fashion, rather than seeing it as a simple casualty of the rise of new media.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / FOCUS
May 21, 2017

North Korea's Unit 180, the cyberwarfare cell that worries the West

North Korea's main spy agency has a special cell called Unit 180 that is likely to have launched some of its most daring and successful cyberattacks, according to defectors, officials and internet security experts.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
May 20, 2017

Looking back on the final days of the Dojunkai apartments

On the fourth anniversary of Uenoshita's demolition, we revisit how its last residents left it.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
May 20, 2017

Hokkaido's ancient place in the modern world

"Even the birds do not fly to Ezo," went a popular 19th-century saying about Japan's northernmost island. "Ezo" means "land of barbarians." Settlement tamed it into "Hokkaido" — "north sea road." But it was a rough passage.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 19, 2017

Slowing down time with a trip to Okinawa's Zamami Island

Growing up in a small beach town on the west coast of Florida, much of my free time as a youth was spent in or around the Gulf of Mexico. The Gulf was almost always warm, not unlike bath water, yet it provided the perfect respite from the stifling heat of the Florida summers.
Reader Mail
May 19, 2017

Kindred nuclear spirit in France

Regarding the story "Film, shows tell stories of Fukushima evacuees" in the May 6 edition, I was one of the 60 people in Amberieu en Bugey — a small town outside Lyon, France — who had the privilege to see Hidenobu Fukumoto's film "Munen" and to listen to him and the four evacuees who were with him...
COMMENTARY / World
May 16, 2017

Why U.S. should get used to the North's ICBMs

The sooner the U.S. accepts that a North Korean ICBM capability is a reality, the sooner it can focus on how to deal with the North Korean problem more comprehensively, moving beyond mere security.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 15, 2017

What can China do about North Korea?

It remains improbable at best that Beijing will see it in its interests to oblige North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to change course
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / ON: TECH
May 14, 2017

Today's modern home helpers

Robotic window wiping
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
May 14, 2017

Unions can offer a hand in dealing with recalcitrant employers

This week's query comes from A.R., who is having some problems with a less-than-cooperative former employer
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 13, 2017

Japan's fisheries still swimming upstream

In March, the internet news site Videonews.com posted a conversation between environmental journalist Tetsuji Ida and Waseda University researcher Yasuhiro Sanada, who writes about fisheries. During the talk, Sanada said that whaling is a "dead industry," and seemed to think that the ongoing controversy...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
May 13, 2017

'The Ryukyu Kingdom: Cornerstone of East Asia': A look at Okinawa's distant past

On May 15, Japan will mark the 45th anniversary of the return of Okinawa. For 27 years prior, the U.S. administered the islands, a continuous period of occupation that began after the Battle of Okinawa in June 1945. This makes the new translation of Mamoru Akamine's 'The Ryukyu Kingdom: Cornerstone of East Asia' both welcome and timely.
COMMENTARY / World
May 13, 2017

Preventing disabilities in the elderly

No one can stop the aging process, but there are many ways to minimize its negative effects.
ASIA PACIFIC
May 13, 2017

Australia says China is conducting extensive espionage

China is conducting extensive espionage against Australia, Canberra's most senior defense official said on Friday in a rare public accusation against its largest trading partner.
Japan Times
WORLD
May 13, 2017

Hackers exploit stolen U.S. spy agency tool to launch global cyberattack

A global cyberattack leveraging hacking tools widely believed by researchers to have been developed by the U.S. National Security Agency hit international shipper FedEx, disrupted Britain's health system and infected computers in nearly 100 countries on Friday.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
May 12, 2017

Japan waking up to the problems of sleeping cash

In recent weeks there have been two well-reported robberies of people carrying large amounts of cash on the street. Thieves got away with ¥384 million after attacking a merchant in a Fukuoka parking lot. In Tokyo's Ginza district, a mugger managed to take ¥40 million from a man walking along a popular...
Reader Mail
May 12, 2017

Kingston errs on 'comfort women'

Jeff Kingston's Counterpoint columns in the April 16 and 23 editions regarding the "comfort women" issue contain clearly erroneous assertions and could lead to misunderstanding among readers. I would like to share several points that the author failed to mention or erroneously presented in his articles....
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 11, 2017

The road to revising the pacifist Constitution

Amending the pacifist Constitution might be in Japan's national interest, but Abe will require plenty of skill if he is to extract himself and the country from the political quagmire of constitutional revision.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 10, 2017

Unending Middle East dilemmas

The Middle East remains a nightmare of complexity, second only to North Korea as a threat to global security.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / TELLING LIVES
May 10, 2017

Skills forged in Kyushu, blades forged in Oregon

After failing to win respect for his craft in Japan, 17th-generation bladesmith Murray Carter brought the Yoshimoto name to Portland.

Longform

A sinkhole in Yashio, which emerged in January, was triggered by a ruptured, aging sewer pipe. Authorities worry that similar sections of infrastructure across the country are also at risk of corrosion.
That sinking feeling: Japan’s aging sewers are an infrastructure time bomb