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Political parties have pledged to reduce social security premiums and raise salaries for medical and nursing care workers in their campaigning for the upcoming Upper House election.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 9, 2025

Premiums and wages at heart of social security debate ahead of Upper House vote

Social security premiums in Japan grew from ¥26.7 trillion in fiscal 2000 to ¥40.7 trillion in fiscal 2022.
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.
Jane Birkin’s original Hermes Birkin bag displayed at Sotheby’s in Paris, on July 3
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 11, 2025

Hermes’ original Birkin bag sells for $10 million at auction to a Japanese buyer

The price shattered the previous record for a handbag at auction, a rare Himalaya Kelly bag in crocodile with a diamond that sold for about $510,000.
Emperor Naruhito smiles at children who performed a dance during a visit to Shine Mongol School in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, on Thursday.
JAPAN
Jul 11, 2025

Emperor visits Mongolian school offering Japanese-style education

Emperor Naruhito also visited Gandantegchinlen Monastery, a key temple in Mongolia that has been influenced by Tibetan Buddhism.
The house of the wife of the late Chizuo Matsumoto, the now-defunct Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult's founder, in Koshigaya, Saitama Prefecture, in July
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jul 16, 2025

Tens of millions of yen found at home of Aum Shinrikyo founder's wife

Chizuo Matsumoto was executed in 2018 over a series of incidents involving the cult, including the 1995 sarin nerve gas attack on Tokyo's subway system.
Egyptian wrestler Osunaarashi has some fun with children during a special Japan Sumo Association event in 2017.
SUMO / INSIDE SUMO
Jul 16, 2025

JSA’s 100th anniversary event is a once-in-a-lifetime chance for sumo fans

People in attendance for the celebration will get a chance to see the rare "sandangamae" performance and demonstrations of ancient sumo.
Wreckage of an Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner plane on the open ground outside Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, where it took off and crashed nearby shortly afterwards, in Ahmedabad, India, on July 12
WORLD / Society
Jul 16, 2025

Air India crash and helicopter crash report rekindle cockpit-video debate

Advocates for cockpit video cameras say footage could fill gaps left by the audio and data recorders, while opponents say concerns about privacy and misuse outweigh benefits.
Food banks are struggling to secure rice and other food items to distribute to people in need as inflation has put a dent in donations.
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 18, 2025

As rice shortage hits donations, food banks urge politicians to tackle poverty

Food banks are struggling to secure rice and other food items to distribute to people in need as inflation has put a dent in donations.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who serves concurrently as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, waves to voters from atop an election campaign van during a rally Friday in Yokohama for Sunday's Upper House election.
JAPAN / Politics / FOCUS
Jul 19, 2025

Ishiba's future in balance as polls hint at rout in Upper House election

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba likes the nitty gritty of policy, cigarettes and making models, but his dream job as Japanese leader could go up in smoke this weekend.
Scottie Scheffler poses with the Claret Jug after winning the British Open in Portrush, Northern Ireland, on Sunday.
MORE SPORTS / Golf
Jul 21, 2025

Scottie Scheffler cruises to first British Open crown

Scheffler resembled a towering giant among men all week on the glorious Causeway Coast.
Neacher Nazia Hussain (left) holds her child whilst teaching a class at a government school at Rajanpur district in southwestern Punjab province.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Jul 22, 2025

Without papers: Ghost lives of millions of Pakistanis

Pakistan launched biometric identification cards in 2000 and registration is increasingly required in all aspects of formal life, especially in cities.
Senate Republicans must undo their reckless confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary, whose anti-vaccine crusade is fueling a deadly measles outbreak and putting more Americans at risk.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 25, 2025

RFK Jr. is making America sick again. Republicans need a cure.

Kennedy, who has no training in medicine or health, has long been the nation’s foremost peddler of junk science and the crackpot conspiracy theories that flow from it.
Ichiro Suzuki, one of the most iconic players in NPB and MLB history, was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame with 99.7% of the vote.
BASEBALL / Longform
Jul 26, 2025

With Hall of Fame induction, Ichiro makes himself heard loud and clear

Across his 28 seasons of professional baseball, Ichiro grew to become a superstar — first in Japan and then in North America — and then an icon.
Ichiro Suzuki speaks during the Baseball Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Cooperstown, New York, on Sunday.
BASEBALL
Jul 28, 2025

Ichiro leads latest class into Baseball Hall of Fame with humor and grace

Ichiro mixed a sharp sense of humor with a serious tone in discussing what made him a Hall of Famer.
In August 1950, The Japan Times reported on the canceling of Hiroshima's fifth annual peace ceremony due to the Korean War.
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Aug 2, 2025

Japan Times 1950: Hiroshima peace festival canceled

In August 1950, the fifth anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the city’s annual ceremony praying for peace was canceled due to ongoing combat on the Korean Peninsula.
Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te has called off a trip to Central and South America that would have included stopovers in the U.S.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jul 29, 2025

Taiwan's Lai calls off trip with U.S. transit as Trump seeks Xi summit

The Taiwanese president had intended to stop in New York and then Dallas as part of a trip to diplomatic allies in Central and South America.
“Yakyu / Baseball: The Transpacific Exchange of the Game” is set to remain on display in Cooperstown for at least five to 10 years — and possibly indefinitely.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Jul 29, 2025

Behind the scenes at the Baseball Hall of Fame's new Yakyu/Baseball exhibit

The exhibit tells a sweeping, richly visual story about the deep and evolving connection between Japan and America’s shared national pastime.
Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te attends an annual coast guard drill in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on June 8.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jul 30, 2025

Taiwan president’s bad week hangs on U.S. trade deal outcome

Whether Washington uses Taipei as a bargaining chip in its trade talks with China is the biggest issue facing Taiwanese leader Lai Ching-te.
Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya and Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar meet with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong in Washington in January.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jul 30, 2025

As China advances and the U.S. retreats, Japan-India ties grow stronger

Located on two ends of the Indo-Pacific region, India and Japan anchor a stable counterweight to China and a mercurial Trump.
Naomi Osaka pumps her first after winning a point against Jelena Ostapenko in their third round of the WTA Canadian Open in Montreal on Friday.
TENNIS
Aug 2, 2025

Sevastova topples Pegula as Osaka advances to fourth round in Montreal

Osaka is one match away from her first quarterfinal run at either a Grand Slam or WTA 1000 event since she returned from maternity leave at the start of 2024.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun (center) chairs a meeting of a Cabinet session to discuss the issue of disarming Hezbollah at the presidential palace of Baabda, east of Beirut, on Aug. 5.
WORLD / Politics
Aug 6, 2025

Lebanon plans to disarm Hezbollah by year-end

The unprecedented move forms part of a November ceasefire between Israel and militant group Hezbollah following months of hostilities.
A project to send cram school lecturers to public schools as substitute teachers is under consideration by the education ministry.
JAPAN
Aug 10, 2025

Cram school lecturers may teach at public schools in Japan

The ministry plans to include related expenses in its budget request for the fiscal year starting next April.
Ichiro speaks during a ceremony to retire his number a T-Mobile Park in Seattle on Sunday.
BASEBALL / MLB
Aug 11, 2025

Mariners to honor Ichiro with statue at T-Mobile Park in 2026

The Seattle Mariners will unveil a statue of franchise legend Ichiro Suzuki at T-Mobile Park during the 2026 season.
Demonstrators burn a Rising Sun flag featuring a portrait of Hideki Tojo, former leader of Japan's Imperial Army and prime minister during World War II, outside the Japanese Consulate in Hong Kong in September 2015.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 14, 2025

Continued demands for an apology ignore Japan’s postwar progress

As the 80th anniversary of World War II’s end nears, demands for renewed Japanese apologies risk empowering authoritarian narratives, especially from China.
A Japanese soldier (Eiji Funakoshi) with tuberculosis struggles to survive in the Filipino countryside during World War II in “Fires on the Plain.”
CULTURE / Film
Aug 20, 2025

‘Fires on the Plain’: Haunting imagery in restored 1959 war film stands the test of time

Now restored in 4K, Kon Ichikawa’s film is a far from simple survival story that stares into humanity’s darkest corners.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba meets Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates at the prime minister's office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
JAPAN
Aug 20, 2025

Japan to donate $550 million to Gavi vaccine alliance over five years

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba will announce the pledge at the Ninth Tokyo International Conference on African Development, set to begin in Yokohama on Wednesday.
Workers carry solar panels to install them at a solar farm in the desert in Lingwu, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, China, in April.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 20, 2025

The world’s biggest polluter is cleaning up its act

Coal output is still climbing, but China’s clean power surge means much of it now sits in stockpiles rather than fueling growth.
Agricultural workers harvest jasmine flowers at sunrise at a field in the village of Shubra Balula in Egypt's northern Nile delta province of Gharbiya on July 7.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Aug 25, 2025

Egyptian farmers behind world's perfumes face climate fight alone

Jasmine has sustained thousands of Egyptian farmers for generations, but rising temperatures, prolonged dry spells and climate-driven pests are putting that legacy at risk.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba meets with his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi, in Tokyo on Friday.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 3, 2025

Can India and Japan deliver on their energy agenda?

As geopolitics in the Indo-Pacific shifts, energy has become central to how India and Japan define their partnership.
"Animator Skill Test Textbook” was written in concert with a test created and administered by the Nippon Anime & Film Culture Association since 2024. The test was designed to help set a baseline for those studying animation, and so that animation studios can get a better idea of applicants' current skill level.
CULTURE / Books
Sep 4, 2025

English textbook targets a skills gap in Japan’s growing anime industry

From "dōga" to “lip flap,” the Nippon Anime & Film Culture Association’s "Animator Skill Test Textbook" teaches aspiring animators how to talk like the pros.

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?