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Some 38% of Bank of Japan watchers in a survey believe the central bank will end its negative rates next week.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 12, 2024

Half of BOJ watchers still see April rate hike while bets on March move jump

The proportion of 50 economists forecasting an end to the world’s last negative rate in April slipped to 54% in the latest survey from 59% in January.
PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan addresses the media during a news conference in August 2023.
MORE SPORTS
Mar 13, 2024

Talks between PGA Tour and Saudi fund 'accelerating'

Speaking to reporters ahead of this week's Players Championship, Monahan said negotiations with Saudi Arabia's PIF were progressing.
Several U.S. lawmakers along with TikTok creators hold a news conference to voice their opposition to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act in Washington on Tuesday.
COMMENTARY
Mar 13, 2024

America’s TikTok addiction isn’t just China’s fault

If you’ve spent time on the platform, you will know how addictive TikTok is. With 170 million users, at least one in three Americans have accessed it.
Paris Saint Germain's Kylian Mbappe celebrates scoring his team's first goal against OGC Nice in Paris on Wednesday.
OLYMPICS
Mar 15, 2024

Mbappe presence at Olympics 'very difficult,' says Deschamps

Deschamps said the Euro 2024 tournament, shortly before the Games, "remains the priority."
A concept model of the Global Combat Air Programme's fighter jet is displayed at the DSEI Japan defense show at Makuhari Messe in Chiba in March 2023.
JAPAN
Mar 15, 2024

Japan's ruling coalition approves export of future joint fighter jet

The step removes a potentially critical hurdle for the multinational Global Combat Aircraft Program involving the U.K. and Italy.
French President Emmanuel Macron (left), German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (center) and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk join hands at a news conference at the Chancellery in Berlin on Friday.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 16, 2024

France and Germany to build arms plant in Ukraine as stakes rise

The announcement will do little to address Ukraine’s most pressing need: getting Kyiv enough ammunition in the short term.
U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak reportedly signed off on introducing a regulation bill after the Premier League failed to agree on a deal to share revenues with smaller clubs.
SOCCER
Mar 19, 2024

U.K. to set out soccer regulation law after club talks stall

The Football Governance Bill will be proposed in the House of Commons on Tuesday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting in Moscow in February via video link.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 19, 2024

What are Putin's top challenges in new six-year term?

Putin won six more years in the Kremlin with a landslide victory in an election where he faced no serious competition. Now he faces important challenges.
Australia and China have rapidly improved their diplomatic relations since the election of the center-left Labor government in May 2022, including the restoration of high-level official meetings and the lifting of trade sanctions imposed by Beijing at the height of tensions.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 20, 2024

China and Australia face difficult diplomatic road after trade spat

Hurdles exist in the form of persistent political differences and increased competition between Beijing and Canberra’s principal ally, the U.S.
The Bank of Japan headquarters in Tokyo. A survey by Bloomberg indicates a majority of analysts surveyed doesn’t expect another rate hike as a base case, but plenty of others are warning that the BOJ may not be finished.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 20, 2024

Investors and economists split on whether BOJ will raise rates again

By moving in March instead of the consensus view of April, Gov. Kazuo Ueda secured space to raise borrowing costs again if data supports the case.
Palestinians walk past the ruins of houses destroyed during Israel's military offensive in Gaza City on March 20.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 21, 2024

The war in Gaza has left a power vacuum, and scant planning to fill it

Experts have dismissed a proposal by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as vague and an unrealistic effort to procrastinate on serious action.
After Donald Trump secured the Republican nomination last week, the buzzword underwent an evolution as he outpaces incumbent President Joe Biden in a number of major polls.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 21, 2024

'What if Trump?' Moshitora reenters Japanese lexicon

The compact Japanese buzzword has resurfaced in local media reports as the ex-president rises through a number of polls.
The Monrovia NSU Challenger bulk carrier transits the expanded canal through the Cocoli Locks of the Panama Canal in April 2023.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Mar 22, 2024

'We all need water': Panama's canal, and people, thirst for more

A severe drought last year caused water levels in Gatun Lake, which provides drinking water and is the main reservoir for the canal, to fall.
Sunao Takao (center) interprets as then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and U.S. President Donald Trump talk prior to a working lunch at the Group of 20 summit in Osaka on June 28, 2019.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 26, 2024

Japan tees up Abe's ex-interpreter to help chart course with Trump

Japanese officials are preparing to deploy the Harvard-educated bureaucrat to bolster engagement with the Republican candidate's campaign.
Jim Rauh, founder of Families Against Fentanyl, holds a photograph of his son Thomas in Akron, Ohio, on March 4. How Trump and Biden address a lethal chapter of the U.S. drug-overdose epidemic will be pivotal in swing states that are likely to decide the election.
WORLD / Politics
Mar 27, 2024

270,000 overdose deaths thrust fentanyl into heart of U.S. presidential race

More than 4 in 10 Americans personally know someone who has died from a drug overdose.
Japan’s Cabinet agreed to ease defense export rules for the nation’s next-generation fighter jet, a concept model of which is seen on display here at a defense show in Chiba in March 2023.
EDITORIALS
Mar 29, 2024

Japan greenlights its defense industry

The government's steps on easing defense export rules will allow Japanese companies to participate more fully in the global market for defense equipment.
The OpenAI offices in San Francisco. The high-profile tech startup is allowing a small group of businesses to test a new system, Voice Engine, that is said to be able to recreate a person’s voice from a 15-second recording, OpenAI announced Friday.
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 30, 2024

OpenAI previews new audio tool that can read text and mimic voices

All the software needs is 15 seconds of recorded audio of a person speaking to re-create their voice.
Israeli police officers hold fire extinguishers during a protest against  Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government in Tel Aviv on Saturday.
WORLD
Mar 31, 2024

Deadly chaos at Gaza aid distribution as WHO renews hospital warning

U.N. agencies have warned repeatedly that northern Gaza is on the verge of a man-made famine.
A woman pays her respects at a makeshift memorial in front of the Crocus City Hall in Moscow on Friday, a week after a deadly attack by gunmen there killed at least 143 people.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 31, 2024

Putin's conspiracy theories make Russians less safe

The Kremlin hopes that blaming Kyiv and the West for the attack will turn a difficult domestic political situation to its advantage.
Anti-government protesters launch a prolonged demonstration against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government in front of the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, in Jerusalem on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 1, 2024

Protests against Netanyahu intensify as cease-fire talks resume

Netanyahu has faced increasing pressure at home and abroad over Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gaza.
Akira Amari, a senior Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker, says Nippon Steel’s acquisition of United States Steel would help counter China’s dominance in steel-making.
BUSINESS / Economy
Apr 2, 2024

Japanese lawmaker says U.S. steel deal would help counter China risks

The $14.1 billion deal would be a win-win for both companies and both economies, said former minister Akira Amari.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Prabowo Subianto, Indonesia's defense minister and president-elect, at the Prime Minister's Office in Tokyo on Wednesday
JAPAN / Politics
Apr 3, 2024

Kishida and Prabowo agree to strengthen Japan-Indonesia ties

Prabowo, who is set to take office as president in October, said that the two countries have built a good cooperative relationship so far.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and U.S. President Joe Biden meet at the White House on Jan. 13, 2023. Kishida will hold talks with Biden in Washington on Wednesday.
JAPAN
Apr 4, 2024

Japan, U.S. and Philippines eye cooperation on mineral supply chains

Japanese and U.S. officials think that security cooperation with the Philippines is important for responding to potential conflicts in the Taiwan Strait.
Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz walks as families and supporters of hostages kidnapped in the deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas take part in a four-day march from Reim to Jerusalem as they call for the release of hostages, near Beit Shemesh, Israel, on March 1.
WORLD / Politics
Apr 4, 2024

Israel’s Gantz ups ante with Netanyahu by calling for early elections

Gantz has seen his popularity among Israeli voters surge as that of Netanyahu has taken a nosedive.
U.S., Japanese and District of Columbia flags are seen on a lamp post near the White House in Washington on Thursday in preparation for next week's official state visit of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
JAPAN / Politics
Apr 5, 2024

Kishida and Biden to discuss joint defense gear production

The move would form part of efforts to deter Russia and China.
A Wheeling-Nippon Steel facility in in Follansbee, West Virginia. Four senior Japanese officials speaking on condition of anonymity said it is still premature to declare the deal dead.
BUSINESS / Companies / ANALYSIS
Apr 5, 2024

Why Japan is not giving up on fraught U.S. Steel deal

Four senior Japanese officials speaking on condition of anonymity said it is still premature to declare the deal dead.
Yayoi Kusama’s “Pumpkin,” once the victim of high waves that dragged it into the sea, sits at the end of a pier on the south side of Naoshima.
CULTURE / Art / Longform
Apr 6, 2024

Why is the most exciting art in Japan so hard to get to?

Japan has a unique movement of public art projects and festivals that are a slog to get to — by design. A writer examines the country's “inconvenient art."
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen speaks with the media after meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng at the Guangdong Zhudao Guesthouse in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, on Saturday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Apr 7, 2024

China providing geospatial intelligence to Russia, U.S. warns

Beijing’s support also includes optics, propellants to be used in missiles and increased space cooperation, according to sources.
Dodgers designated hitter Shohei Ohtani runs out a fly ball against the San Francisco Giants at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles on Wednesday.
BASEBALL / MLB
Apr 8, 2024

Hard feelings after catching Ohtani's first Dodgers home run ball

Ambar Roman and her husband were left feeling pressured and possibly swindled by Dodgers security staff.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida speaks during an interview at the Prime Minister's Office in Tokyo on Friday, ahead of his visit to the United States this week.
JAPAN / Politics
Apr 8, 2024

Kishida advocates wider defense network ahead of U.S. trip

The Japanese leader said he would push ahead on cooperation with like-minded countries on security, including on defense equipment and technology.

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji