Search - news

 
 
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / HIT AND RUN
Dec 20, 2014

Little sizzle found during NPB winter

Where will Chihiro Kaneko and Takashi Toritani be playing next season?
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics / DECISION 2014
Dec 15, 2014

Abe claims mandate for economic, security policies despite lowest turnout ever

Emerging as the big winner in the Lower House election, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declares he has a renewed mandate to keep pushing his policy agenda.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Dec 14, 2014

American in North Korea reportedly denounces U.S., seeks asylum in Venezuela

A U.S. citizen who illegally entered North Korea delivered a lengthy denunciation of U.S. domestic and foreign policy Sunday and said he was seeking political asylum in Venezuela, the North's official media said.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / BLACK EYE
Nov 28, 2014

A world away from Ferguson but feeling the flames

I went through an entire day in Yokohama without a single person mentioning that my country was on fire. Of course, they knew, but what could they have said, anyway?
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Nov 26, 2014

FIBA bans Japan from international competition

Although nearly a month passed since FIBA's Oct. 31 deadline for the Japan Basketball Association to present a merger plan for the bj-league and the NBL, among other demands, basketball's world governing body delivered the expected news.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Nov 19, 2014

San Francisco's huff with Hashimoto over 'comfort women' reveals double standards

San Francisco's reaction to Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's comments about 'comfort women' says much about equality between nations, about how we judge each other through cultural lenses and blinders, and how we have to keep finding ways to address grievances from our past.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 10, 2014

GOP takeover could mean trouble for Japan

Perhaps no one in Asia is happier than Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his ruling Liberal Democratic Party to see Republicans take over control of the U.S. Congress. In fact, Japan's plummeting currency and the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal put Abe in a tough corner.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Markets / ANALYSIS
Nov 6, 2014

After BOJ shocks market, some ask why it gave no warning

Hours after the Bank of Japan caught central bank watchers off guard by boosting stimulus, officials were fending off complaints about its communications.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Nov 1, 2014

Media whips up fuss over S&M bar claim

First came what the tabloids referred to as "W-jinin," the resignations of two female Cabinet members — Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Yuko Obuchi and Justice Minister Midori Matsushima — on the same day.
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 28, 2014

New environment minister admits discrepancies in funding reports

Adding to the rash of scandals suddenly plaguing the Abe Cabinet, another new minister admits there are accounting discrepancies in the political funding reports of one of his support groups.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 26, 2014

Double-edged media sword

What was not widely known about the late Benjamin C. Bradlee, the Washington Post editor during the Watergate Scandal of the early 1970s, was that he was quite sensitive to the risk of the news media abusing its power when it came to presidential politics.
JAPAN / History
Oct 16, 2014

Government requests revision of 1996 U.N. sex slave report

The Abe administration asks the author of a U.N. report that accused Japan of wartime military sexual slavery to amend the 1996 document.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Oct 16, 2014

China blocks BBC website as Hong Kong tensions rise

Chinese censors have blocked the website of Britain's national broadcaster, the BBC said in a statement late on Wednesday, as tensions rise in Hong Kong between pro-democracy protesters and police.
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Oct 7, 2014

Gay couples cheer U.S. Supreme Court move, make wedding, family plans

Marina Gomberg was in bed on Monday morning when she heard the news that the U.S. Supreme Court had effectively made gay marriage legal again in Utah and she immediately started dreaming that she and her wife could become mothers.
JAPAN / Media / DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN
Oct 4, 2014

Yakuza do what Abe Cabinet pick can't

In most countries, police officers and criminals are supposed to be on opposite sides of the law, especially the higher up the chain of command you go, but Prime Minister Shinzo Abe doesn't appear to think this is necessary.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Oct 4, 2014

U.S. defends response to Ebola case; about 50 people under observation

U.S. officials Friday broadly defended the response to the country's first case of Ebola, although one acknowledged that while the government is confident of containing the virus, it had been "rocky" in Dallas where the patient is in serious condition.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 3, 2014

A serial intervener, after all

In launching his presidency's seventh bombing campaign, Barack Obama has shown himself to be one of the most militarily aggressive U.S. presidents since World War II.
ASIA PACIFIC
Sep 30, 2014

Chinese receive limited coverage of 'illegal' Hong Kong protests

On a day when front pages of newspapers in Hong Kong and around the world carried stories on prodemocracy protesters confronting riot police in the city, the lead article in China's official People's Daily focused on a new book of President's Xi Jinping's speeches.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 12, 2014

Daily Asahi Shimbun retracts faulty Fukushima story, sacks top editor

The Asahi Shimbun on Friday carried front page articles and an apology concerning an erroneous article that alleged workers fled the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant during the meltdown crisis in March 2011, retracting the scoop story that drew strong criticism from the public, lawmakers and government...
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / NPB NOTEBOOK
Sep 3, 2014

Fan-favorite Inaba jumping into sunset

Atsunori Inaba may have been Japan's most popular player among foreign fans during the 2013 World Baseball Classic. The quadrennial competition doesn't just bring 16 nations together, it allows the baseball cultures of various nations to come together. Prominent among these is Japan's ouendan.
Japan Times
WORLD
Aug 27, 2014

Poroshenko to seek cease-fire after ‘very tough’ talks with Putin

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko promised after late-night negotiations with Russia's Vladimir Putin to work on an urgent cease-fire plan to defuse the separatist conflict in the east of his former Soviet republic.
Japan Times
WORLD
Aug 23, 2014

U.S. says Russia must pull convoy from Ukraine or face more sanctions

The United States on Friday demanded Moscow remove an aid convoy it has sent into rebel-held eastern Ukraine without permission, accusing Russia of a flagrant violation of the sovereignty of its former Soviet neighbor and threatening more sanctions.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 15, 2014

Race- and religion-based politics slows Asia's progress

How fitting it would be if, on his next return visit to Asia, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry — on behalf of America's first African-American president — helped to push the region, including China, to move beyond the racial and ethnic stereotypes that are constraining economic growth.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?