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U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Oct. 18.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 25, 2023

Biden treads tightrope on Israel-Hamas cease-fire

The balancing act is becoming tougher by the day, with reports that Washington is concerned about Israel's plan of action for a Gaza invasion.
Women gather for a demonstration during a women’s strike in Reykjavik, Iceland, on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 25, 2023

Women strike to highlight inequality in most gender equal society

The protest focused attention on a gender pay gap, the uneven burden of unpaid work within the home and violence that still afflicts women.
Baby soap donated by sanitary products company Saraya to the city of Kashiwara, Osaka Prefecture, has been distributed at child care support facilities in the city.
BUSINESS
Oct 26, 2023

Donation platform matches firms with local governments in Japan

The platform not only helps improve the welfare of residents, but also allows companies to make effective use of inventories.
Lawyers Kazuyuki Minami (left) and Masafumi Yoshida (right) representing a transgender woman show off signs that say "unconstitutional" and "sent back" to a lower court, during a news conference Wednesday in Tokyo after a Supreme Court decision.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 25, 2023

Supreme Court hands down landmark decision on transgender rights

A law requiring sterilization surgery to change a person's legal gender has been declared “unconstitutional."
Participants hold a giant rainbow flag during a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Pride Parade in Hong Kong
WORLD / Society
Oct 25, 2023

How nations allow or restrict legal gender change

A small number of countries have made it easier for transgender people to change their legal gender, while other nations have restricted such changes.
Tents for displaced Palestinians at a camp, operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, in western Khan Younis, Gaza, on, Oct. 17.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 26, 2023

Record 114 million people now displaced worldwide, says U.N.

Almost one-third of all displaced people originated from just three countries: Afghanistan, Syria and Ukraine.
A daughter of Palestinian man Ali Daba shows her bracelet at their shelter in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, on Tuesday
WORLD / Society
Oct 26, 2023

Gaza families wear ID bracelets to avoid burial in mass graves

With so many bodies, Palestinians in Gaza are burying the unidentified dead with a number instead of a name, residents say.
The simplest option for many Japanese industries facing labor shortages might be to do what the taxi sector is doing — keep people in the workforce longer.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 26, 2023

Octogenarian taxi drivers to the labor-crunch rescue

An option for many Japanese industries facing labor shortages might be to do what the taxi sector is doing — keep people in the workforce longer.
SUMO
Oct 26, 2023

Takakeisho heads to Kyushu Basho with yokozuna promotion in sight

The 27-year-old has put himself in line for elevation to the sport’s highest rank following the upcoming Kyushu meet.
A soldier installs an Israeli flag on a tank during a military drill near Israel's border with Lebanon in northern Israel, on Thursday
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2023

U.S. strikes Syrian facilities after attacks by Iran-backed militia

U.S. President Joe Biden ordered strikes on two facilities in Syria following attacks on U.S. troops in the past week, the Pentagon said, warning the U.S. will take additional measures if attacks by Iran's proxies continue.
While inaka sushi still uses dashi broth to flavor some ingredients, it's possible to make this sushi 100% vegan.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Oct 29, 2023

Sushi sans fish: How rural traditions led to vegan-friendly rolls

Leave the salmon behind with “inaka sushi,” which trades raw fish for mushrooms, ginger and other fresh veggies.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 27, 2023

Delusion led suspect to attack KyoAni studio, doctor tells court

The assessment contrast with that of another doctor, who said the suspect's delusion had almost no influence in the attack.
Takuya Matsunaga (right), who lost his wife and daughter in a 2019 crash in Tokyo's Ikebukuro district, attends a news conference on Friday along with his father-in-law, Yoshinori Uehara.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 27, 2023

Ex-Japan bureaucrat ordered to pay damages over fatal 2019 crash

Kozo Iizuka had already been sentenced to five years in prison, after the car he was driving crashed into Mana Matsunaga, 31, and her daughter Riko, 3.
A woman walks past newly unveiled lettering that references the Oct. 29 Itaewon crush in Seoul. A more fully developed memorial was later built to commemorate the event and the more than 150 people who lost their lives.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society / Longform
Oct 27, 2023

One year on, Itaewon's scars remain

A year on from the Itaewon crush, foot traffic in the Seoul neighborhood is picking back up. But what the future of the area is still in doubt.
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 27, 2023

Amid scrutiny, Kishida emphasizes tax cuts to pull out from deflation

The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan has heavily criticized the government for its belated response to rising inflation.
Smoke rises from a leveled building as people gather amid the destruction in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on Gaza City on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 28, 2023

Israel rebuffs allies’ calls to ‘pause’ Gaza assault

The issue has opened the first public split between Israel and its backers, including the U.S., the EU, U.K. and other G7 members such as Japan.
Lewiston Chief of Police David St. Pierre speaks as Maine Gov. Janet Mills looks on during a news conference after mass shooting suspect Robert Card was found dead on Friday.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Oct 28, 2023

Suspect in Maine mass shooting Is dead, official says

The discovery of the suspect's body ends a sweeping search that had forced thousands of residents throughout the U.S. state to remain in their homes.
The remains of the music festival near Israel's border with Gaza where Hamas militants opened fire on civilians.
WORLD
Oct 28, 2023

How the Hamas carnage unfolded on Israel's 'Black Shabbat'

The attack was meticulously planned for months right under the nose of Israel's vaunted military intelligence services.
Matthew Perry at the premiere of "The Kennedys After Camelot" in Beverly Hills, California, in 2017
CULTURE / Entertainment news
Oct 29, 2023

'Friends' actor Matthew Perry dies at age 54

Law enforcement sources told the Los Angeles Times that Perry was found unresponsive in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home.
Israeli army artillery personnel near Sderot, Israel, on Saturday
WORLD
Oct 29, 2023

Israel pounds Gaza as Red Cross warns of 'intolerable' suffering

The U.N. warned thousands more civilians could die in Gaza as Israel declared the war had entered a "second stage."
Israelis gather in Tel Aviv on Saturday as part of ongoing demonstrations to demand the immediate release of the hostages being held by Hamas fighters in Gaza.
WORLD
Oct 29, 2023

'Anxiety' racks Israeli hostage families as army assaults Gaza

In a protest outside Israel's defense headquarters in Tel Aviv, dozens gathered carrying pictures of the captives, chanting "return them now."
Thon Soukhon, who has been a ranger in Virachey since the forest became one of Cambodia’s first national parks in 1993, holds a rope as he crosses a rain-swollen river within the protected area.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy / OUR PLANET
Oct 29, 2023

In the name of sustainability, Cambodia risks its ‘final frontier’ of biodiversity

Virachey National Park is a rare untouched wilderness in Southeast Asia, but potential hydropower plans threaten its future.
Hamas’ Ismail Haniyeh (left) and the former emir of Qatar arrive at a cornerstone-laying ceremony for the new Hamad residential neighborhood in Gaza in 2012.
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Oct 30, 2023

Israel-Hamas war escalation puts Qatar’s clout to the test

The nation has positioned itself as an key go-between, but has been criticized for housing Hamas leaders while maintaining channels to Israel.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (center) and state officials visit Anitkabir, mausoleum of Turkish Republic's Founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, to mark the 100th anniversary of the Turkish Republic in Ankara on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 30, 2023

Gaza overshadows Turkey's centenary as Erdogan pledges support

Daylong events honored the republic's secular founder whose transformation of the overwhelmingly Muslim nation created long-standing divisions.
U.S. President Joe Biden signs an Executive Order about Artificial Intelligence as Vice President Kamala Harris looks on, at the White House in Washington on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 31, 2023

Biden inks executive order to curb AI risks to national security

Artificial intelligence technology has been making rapid gains in capability and popularity in an environment of, so far, limited regulation.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida attends an extraordinary session at the Lower House of parliament in Tokyo on Oct. 23.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 31, 2023

Prime Minister Kishida and a month of misery

The challenges Fumio Kishida faces are eroding confidence in his leadership and are likely to influence policy decision-making.
A man stands next to a robot in use at ROLEC Gehause-Systeme in Rinteln, Germany on Oct. 6
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 31, 2023

As baby boomers retire, German businesses turn to robots

Small and medium-sized companies are turning to automation as the gradual retirement of the post-war "baby boom" generation tightens the labor squeeze.
Reporters take cover upon hearing sirens warning of an incoming rocket attack from Gaza, in the southern Israeli city of Sderot, on Oct. 23
WORLD / Politics
Oct 31, 2023

Media reporting on Israel-Hamas war face singular challenges

Lack of access to Gaza, with both the Israeli and Egyptian access points closed, is creating difficulties journalists say they have rarely seen before.
Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa waits for U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to arrive for a meeting in New York in September.
JAPAN / Politics / FOCUS
Nov 2, 2023

Japan top envoy faces diplomatic test on trip to Israel and Jordan

One of the key focuses of Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa's trip will be the role Japan can play in easing the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.
A serviceman, wearing prosthetic legs, walks past Ukrainian flags symbolizing fallen soldiers on the Independence Square in Kyiv, on Oct. 30.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 2, 2023

'When will it end?': Ukrainians turn to psychics for war forecasts

Military forecasts by Ukraine's most popular soothsayers rack up hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube and TikTok.

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past