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May 25, 2025
 

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LDP

Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito lawmakers meet to discuss a pension reform bill at the Diet in Tokyo on Thursday.
JAPAN / Politics
May 24, 2025
Bill that would raise Japanese pension benefits on track to pass parliament
The ruling bloc will back the CDP's amendment, which includes a plan to raise basic pension benefits.
LDP Secretary-General Hiroshi Moriyama speaks during an event in Nakatane, Kagoshima Prefecture, earlier this month.
JAPAN / Politics
May 24, 2025
LDP holds meeting to let proponents of tax cut blow off steam
The LDP leadership has decided not to include a consumption tax reduction in its campaign pledges for the upcoming Upper House election.
Shinjiro Koizumi, Japan's newly appointed agriculture minister, arrives at the ministry building in Tokyo on Wednesday. He replaced Taku Eto, who quit after saying he’s never needed to buy rice, a comment that angered many people.
EDITORIALS
May 23, 2025
No more mister rice guy
When the remarks triggered a predictable and understandable backlash, Eto explained that he was trying to make a joke.
New farm minister Shinjiro Koizumi speaks during a news conference on Wednesday in Tokyo.
JAPAN / FOCUS
May 22, 2025
‘Rice minister’ Koizumi faces urgent task to bring prices down quickly
Lawmakers have been questioning whether auctioning stockpiled rice is really effective in bringing down prices.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's Cabinet saw its approval rate rewriting the lowest level in May since he took office last October last year.
JAPAN / Politics
May 22, 2025
Ishiba Cabinet approval falls to 20.9% in new poll
The Cabinet's disapproval rating rose 1.7 points to 52.9%.
Liberal Democratic Party policy chief Itsunori Onodera (fourth from left) visits a driver's license center in Shinagawa Ward, Tokyo, on Wednesday to see how foreign driver's licenses are converted into Japanese ones.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
May 22, 2025
Japan considers toughening rules on driver's license conversions
The National Police Agency revealed the plan amid concerns that the system for converting a foreign license is too easy.
Agriculture minister Taku Eto (left), who resigned on Wednesday, and former Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi
JAPAN / Politics
May 21, 2025
Shinjiro Koizumi takes farm ministry reins after predecessor's rice gaffe
Taku Eto resigned from the post after coming under fire for bragging about how much rice his supporters give him.
The parliament passed a bill to revise the law regulating Nippon Telegraph and Telephone's operations at a House of Councilors plenary session on Wednesday.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 21, 2025
Japan enacts revised NTT law
The amendments to the NTT law no longer require the former state-run company to provide uniform fixed-line telephone services throughout the country.
Agriculture minister Taku Eto answers reporters questions at the at the Prime Minister's Office on Monday.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 21, 2025
Why Ishiba pulled a 180 on the gaffe-stricken farm minister
Taku Eto is the first minister to fall since the Japanese leader formed his Cabinet last October
As Japan confronts global economic shifts and mounting fiscal pressures, its upcoming election risks being consumed by a stale, politically fraught debate over the consumption tax.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 21, 2025
Don’t reopen the ‘demon's gate’ debate in Japan
As Japan confronts global economic shifts and mounting fiscal pressures, its upcoming election risks being consumed by a stale, politically fraught debate over the consumption tax.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, president of the Liberal Democratic Party, apologized on Tuesday at the Prime Minister's Office to Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki over LDP member Shoji Nishida's inappropriate remark about war-related exhibits in the prefecture.
JAPAN / Politics
May 20, 2025
Ishiba apologizes over LDP member's remark on World War II exhibits
LDP lawmaker Shoji Nishida called descriptions on a monument commemorating the Himeyuri corps of female students who died in the Battle of Okinawa "a revision of history."
Support for Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's government was at 27.4%, down from 32.6% a month ago, a Kyodo poll showed.
JAPAN / Politics
May 18, 2025
Support for Japan PM Ishiba hits record low as rice price soars, poll shows
Support for Ishiba's government was at 27.4%, down from 32.6% a month ago, a Kyodo poll showed.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba attends a Cabinet meeting in Tokyo on Friday.
JAPAN / Politics
May 16, 2025
Pension bill makes it to parliament after two-month delay
Internal resistance from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party toward certain proposals in the draft bill led to the delay.
As Japan heads into summer elections, debate over the consumption tax has intensified, with opposition parties demanding cuts to ease pressure on households and the government defending the levy as essential amid rising debt and economic uncertainty.
EDITORIALS
May 16, 2025
Don’t overreact to the consumption tax debate
Economic uncertainty in combination with rising prices are squeezing the budgets of households, businesses and the government.
With Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's ruling coalition in crisis, the opposition divided and the Democratic Party for the People gaining momentum, Japan’s upcoming Upper House election could trigger a major political realignment.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 15, 2025
Elections are fast approaching, and none of the big parties are ready
With Ishiba in place, the fear that the LDP could next lose its current majority in the Upper House in July is pervasive.
Aso serves as the head of the LDP's task force on Japan’s Indo-Pacific strategy.
JAPAN / Politics
May 14, 2025
Conservative heavyweights join forces in LDP panel on Indo-Pacific
The panel has prompted speculation it could serve as an occasion to coalesce support against the government in the upcoming months.
Liberal Democratic Party executives at a General Council meeting on Tuesday at the party's headquarters in Tokyo
JAPAN / Politics
May 14, 2025
LDP approves pension reform legislation
The government aims to adopt the legislation at a Cabinet meeting Friday and submit it to the current session of the Diet, the country's parliament.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba enters his office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Politics / FOCUS
May 13, 2025
Consumption tax set to dominate Upper House election debate
Broaching the subject has traditionally been seen as akin to kicking a hornet's nest.
Senior officials of Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito agreed Tuesday on the need to draft a supplementary budget before a possible extraordinary session of the Diet this autumn.
JAPAN / Politics
May 13, 2025
LDP and Komeito agree to draft supplementary budget before autumn session
The extra budget is expected to fund measures to deal with inflation and the impact of U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs.
Since the LDP resumed discussions on the issue in February, members against introducing a selective dual surname system have been gaining momentum, calling for expanding the use of maiden names.
JAPAN
May 12, 2025
LDP to forgo compiling bill on dual surname system
The LDP concluded that it would be unwise to create divisions within the party ahead of this summer's election for the House of Councilors.
From France to Mali, a deportee's struggle far from home
Moussa Sacko, a Malian deported from France — where he had lived since he was a young child — stands on a street in Bamako, Mali, in December. Compared with his home in France, Bamako feels like a different planet, Sacko said.
Trump announces Nippon Steel-U.S. Steel ‘partnership’ deal
U.S. President Donald Trump points as he boards Air Force One en route to New Jersey, at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, on Friday.
Travelers avoid trips to Japan over viral comic book’s quake prediction
Visitors walk along Nakamise-dori as they visit Sensoji Temple in Tokyo's Asakusa district in March.
Tokyo's Yamanote Line resumes suspended train operations
All services on East Japan Railway's Yamanote Line in Tokyo were suspended for early Friday morning due to wire trouble.
Onosato set for yokozuna promotion after clinching Emperor’s Cup
Onosato after defeating Kotozakura at Ryokugikan in Tokyo on Friday. The win gave him a 13-0 record and clinched the Emperor's Cup, assuring him of promotion to yokozuna next week.
AI fiction is already here. Are humans ready?
After last year’s controversy over using AI to write about 5% of her novel, Rie Qudan was asked by an advertising magazine to write a short story where she uses AI for 95% of it. The resulting short story, “Kage no ame” (“Rain Shadow”), was published March 25.  
Six short films that capture our world in mere minutes
“Marion” provides a glimpse into the lives of bull dodgers, who perform a nonlethal version of bullfighting.
As Taiwan looks to boost ‘unofficial ties,’ Paraguay’s leader offers facilitator role
Paraguayan President Santiago Pena speaks during an interview with The Japan Times in Tokyo on Thursday.
GCAP next-gen fighter joint venture likely to be running by this summer
A concept model of the Global Combat Air Program's fighter jet is displayed during the DSEI Japan defense exhibition in the city of Chiba on Wednesday.
NTT develops world's first 'flying lightning rod' using drones
NTT's drone — aimed at triggering, then redirecting lightning — is described as a "flying lightning rod."

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

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
By Alex K.T. Martin

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