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Abdulaziz bin Salman, Saudi Arabia's energy minister, during an interview at the Energy Ministry in Riyadh on Monday
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Dec 5, 2023

Saudi Arabia says 'absolutely not' to oil phaseout at COP28

About 200 countries must come to a consensus decision at the meeting in Dubai.
Japanese hotels have been among the most popular real estate investments in the Asia-Pacific region this year.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 5, 2023

Blackstone buys Kyoto hotel from Goldman in $54 million deal

Japanese hotels have been among the most popular real estate investments in the Asia-Pacific region this year.
Pedestrians cross a street in the Zhongshan district of Taipei. Many voters on the island, especially those in their 20s and 30s, say they are weary of geopolitics and yearn for a campaign more focused on their needs at home.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 5, 2023

The wild card in Taiwan’s election: Frustrated young voters

Beyond geopolitics, they yearn for more focus on bread-and-butter issues such as rising housing costs, slow income growth and narrowing career prospects.
A representative for Morgan Stanley, which in August said it was 70% of the way toward reaching the $1 trillion in sustainable financing it’s told investors it will achieve by 2030, declined to comment beyond referring to the bank’s latest ESG report.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 5, 2023

What banks really mean when they put trillions into ESG

With each bank announcing a different target, investors are left with little insight into the ways in which banks are defining what’s sustainable.
JAPAN / Society
Dec 6, 2023

Tokyo aims to make high school tuition free of charge for all

For families in the capital with an annual income of less than ¥9.1 million, current financial aid essentially makes high school tuition free.
Workers collect recyclable garbage including plastic bottles on World Environment Day in Tokyo in June 2020.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 6, 2023

New solutions tackle Japan’s waste problem at its core

Issues like the plastics and climate crises seem insurmountable — until we apply "systemic design," as several Japanese initiatives are showing.
While broad-based action at the COP28 summit is critical, the fact is that just a few key actors such as the U.S., China and India have the power to bring about a radical reduction in global emissions.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 6, 2023

COP28 can deliver progress on climate change, but will it?

Committed global climate action at every level of government, the economy, and society is needed to tackle such a complex, multifaceted challenge.
What’s worrying from the stock market’s perspective is that the Reserve Bank of India is taking more direct steps to rein in debt-fueled consumption.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 7, 2023

The world’s most-loved emerging market is feeling jittery

India's economic prosperity is primarily being attributed to a small elite class referred to as the "Octopus class."
A radar facility set up for coastal surveillance by the Ground Self-Defense Force's Yonaguni base on Yonaguni island in Okinawa Prefecture.
COMMENTARY / Japan / Geoeconomic Briefing
Dec 14, 2023

Acquiring counterstrike capabilities is no simple matter for Japan

Under its defense and security strategies, deterrence by denial and deterrence by punishment are the essence of Japan’s deterrence capabilities.
Delegates arrive at Dubai's Expo City during COP28 on Saturday
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Dec 9, 2023

Oil is everywhere at COP28, vexing those seeking its demise

To many of the activists in attendance, the prominence of the oil and gas industry is a travesty.
Central Dublin, near where recent protests and riots took place. The uproar came after a stabbing attack left three young children and two adults injured.
WORLD / Politics
Dec 11, 2023

Dublin’s riot was not a surprise to those who watch the far right

The disorder on Nov. 23 may have appeared to come from nowhere. But experts say it showed deep social problems and an emboldened anti-immigrant movement.
Gold ornaments on display for sale at a Chow Tai Fook jewellery store in Shanghai.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 11, 2023

Young Chinese spurn traditional investments in favor of gold

The trend underscores uncertainty about growth prospects in the world's second-largest economy, which has not recovered from COVID-19 as fast as expected.
The COP28 climate conference is being held at Expo City Dubai for a total of 100,000 attendees, 2,000 of which are from fossil fuel companies.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 11, 2023

COP28 like a trade show? That’s not a bad thing.

Some lament the presence of many fossil fuel representatives among the 100,000 attendees of COP28 in Dubai, failing to recognize their key role.
A record number of Japanese investors have put their money into domestic private credit deals in search of higher returns this year.
BUSINESS / Economy
Dec 12, 2023

Private credit is attracting record numbers of Japanese investors

An unprecedented 236 limited partners have provided money to private capital managers this year through September, more than triple the level of 2017.
An attendee plays Fortnite, made by Epic Games, during the E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles in 2019.
BUSINESS / Companies
Dec 12, 2023

Legal defeat for Google threatens $200 billion app store industry

Until now, Google and Apple have charged commissions of as much as 30% to software developers who typically have had few other options.
COP28 President Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber gives a press conference at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai on Dec. 4.
COMMENTARY
Dec 8, 2023

Climate solutions are debatable, but science is inescapable

How we set environmental policies depends on how we interpret the facts.
An oil pump outside Saint-Fiacre, near Paris, in 2019
BUSINESS
Dec 13, 2023

Big Oil's bid to woo ESG investors fails to impress

A pledge by 50 of the biggest oil and gas companies at the U.N. climate talks in Dubai commits to reaching near-zero methane emissions by 2030.
COP28 President Sultan Al Jaber, of the United Arab Emirates, addresses the plenary, after a draft of a negotiation deal was released, at the COP28 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai on Wednesday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Dec 13, 2023

Nations strike deal at COP28 to transition away from fossil fuels

More than 100 countries had lobbied hard for strong language in the deal to "phase out" oil, gas and coal use, but came up against powerful opposition.
Wiring connects photovoltaic panels at the Al Dhafra Solar project, constructed by Electricite de France (EDF) and Jinko Power Technology, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, in January.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Dec 13, 2023

China’s pressured clean energy industry sees Saudi potential

Saudi Arabia is said to offer benefits including low-cost electricity, good relations with other countries and a central location.
Japan is aiming to boost renewable power capacity to help achieve its 2050 goal of becoming carbon neutral.
BUSINESS
Dec 13, 2023

Three groups picked for second round of offshore wind power tender

Japan's offshore wind power market is set to grow as the government aims to have 10 gigawatts of offshore wind farm deals by 2030.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / 20 QUESTIONS
Dec 29, 2023

20 Questions: The best answers of 2023

Our interviewees this year gave a lot of advice for living a good life and paying attention to the things that matter most.
Low fertility threatens to undermine South Korea’s economic future by shrinking its workforce and slowing consumption.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Dec 14, 2023

South Korea set to see fertility rate fall even further

The country already has the world’s lowest fertility rate at 0.78 as of 2022.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 14, 2023

It’s time to kick our addiction to fossil fuels

The COP28 deal is historic in that it calls for a transition away from fossil fuels for the first time, but it's too weak to tackle the climate emergency.
While Hayao Miyazaki’s return to filmmaking, “The Boy and the Heron,” did not attain the ¥10 billion milestone that the beloved animator’s movies had once routinely surpassed, it debuted at the top of the North American box office and became the first original anime film to lead the box office in the United States and Canada.
CULTURE / Film / 2023 in Review
Dec 15, 2023

Japan’s auteurs and anime triumphed in 2023

From Hayao Miyazaki's “The Boy and the Heron” to Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Monster,” the box-office hits kept coming.
Scientists discovered what they described as widespread and dangerous levels of toxic chromium in areas of Northern California severely burned by wildfires in 2019 and 2020.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Dec 15, 2023

Wildfires are unleashing dangerous metals from soil, study shows

Firefighters and anyone living downwind of a wildfire would be at most immediate risk if chromium 6 becomes airborne.
Firefighters tackle a fire in a field in San Buenaventura in the Bolivian Amazon in November.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Dec 15, 2023

Despite COP28 deal on fossil fuels, 1.5 C goal likely out of reach

The "UAE Consensus" does not commit the world to phasing out oil and gas, nor to near-term timelines for transitioning away from fossil fuels.
JAPAN
Dec 15, 2023

JR Central changes opening date of maglev shinkansen line

The line will open "no earlier than 2027" due to uncertainties over when drilling works for a tunnel in Shizuoka Prefecture can commence.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim at the start of a bilateral meeting in Tokyo on Saturday
JAPAN / Politics
Dec 16, 2023

Japan-ASEAN summit aims to advance 'security cooperation'

Japan is also expected to use the summit to push energy cooperation as it seeks to export emissions-reducing tech that critics have questioned.
Diggers move piles of coal after it was unloaded from a ship at Lianyungang Port in China's Jiangsu province.
ENVIRONMENT
Dec 16, 2023

Coal use hits record in 2023, Earth's hottest year

The IEA reported that nations would burn even more coal this year than in 2022, but that demand would tail off starting in 2024.
Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda, who took office in April, has been considered a skeptic of negative interest rates.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 17, 2023

One small step for BOJ. One giant leap for the yen.

Japan can hold off on undoing negative interest rates

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