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According to a FIFA report, Brazil's bid for the 2027 Women's World Cup offers good stadiums, with the country having already hosted the 2014 World Cup.
SOCCER / Women's World cup
May 8, 2024

Brazil's bid to host Women's World Cup tops European rival

According to the report, Brazil's bid offers good stadiums, having already hosted the 2021 World Cup.
Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge (center) among his pacers during a training session in Kaptagat, Kenya, on Saturday.
OLYMPICS / Athletics
May 8, 2024

Kipchoge's road to third Olympic gold starts in Kenya's Rift Valley

"I'm feeling good. But I think the next months will be more interesting," the athlete said after a training session.
A police officer handles money seized during an operation against 'Ndrangheta in this photo taken at an unknown location in Italy on Sept. 6.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
May 8, 2024

Italy's mafia forgoes extortion, turns to white-collar crime

With extortion rackets falling out of fashion and murders largely frowned upon by the godfathers, Italy's mafia is venturing into white-collar crime.
China’s fading appeal to foreign firms comes despite Chinese President Xi Jinping’s pledge in November to take more "heart-warming” measures to ease access to the world’s second-largest economy.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 10, 2024

EU firms’ appetite for China investment sinks to record low

Only 13% of firms surveyed earlier this year saw the country as a top destination for investments, a survey found.
Ryo Wakabayashi, a distal myopathy patient, lives alone in the city of Fukushima.
JAPAN / Science & Health / Regional Voices: Tohoku
May 20, 2024

Persistence pays off with approval of distal myopathy drug

The disease is estimated to affect only 300 to 400 people in Japan.
Philippine and U.S. Marines watch as a projectile hits a target at sea during a live-fire exercise against an imaginary "invasion" force as part of the annual joint military drills, on a strip of sand dunes in Laoag on Luzon island's northwest coast, on May 6.
ASIA PACIFIC
May 11, 2024

U.S. builds web of arms, ships and bases in the Pacific to deter China

With missiles, submarines and alliances, the Biden administration has built a presence in the region to rein in Beijing’s expansionist goals.
Ground Self-Defense Force soldiers participate in a seminar to prevent harassment at the GSDF's Camp Asaka in Tokyo on April 16.
JAPAN / FOCUS
May 13, 2024

Japan's military needs more women. But it's still failing on harassment.

Nine months after the Defense Ministry pledged to take drastic measures, it has no plans to implement a national system for reviewing training standards.
Activists from Amnesty International march in support of the Uyghurs during Chinese President Xi Jinping's two-day state visit in France on May 6.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
May 13, 2024

China accused of targeting overseas citizens for political activism

Students said their family in China received threats after they attended events such as the commemoration of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.
Urawa's Kiko Seike (right) celebrates with Yu Endo during the AFC Women’s Championship Cup at Urawa Komaba Stadium in Saitama on Friday.
SOCCER
May 13, 2024

Kiko Seike shines as Urawa Reds Ladies add two titles to collection over weekend

Urawa won the AFC Women’s Championship Cup on Friday and clinched the WE League title on Sunday.
Japan’s custody system may soon change with the introduction of joint custody, though issues like a lack of protection against domestic violence and abuse must also be tackled.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 10, 2024

Joint custody alone won’t fix Japan’s flawed system

Japan could be on the verge of adopting joint custody. While to some this is a step in the right direction, it may not be enough to protect families.
Spectators gather on South Padre Island to watch the planned launch of SpaceX's next-generation Starship spacecraft from the company's Boca Chica launchpad, near Brownsville, Texas, on March 14.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 14, 2024

Musk's SpaceX is quick to build in Texas, slow to pay its bills

Unpaid bills and finger-pointing among contractors have led many construction-industry businesses to file liens against SpaceX properties.
Visitors walk along the ground-level pathway at the newly expanded Benjakitti Park in central Bangkok, where trees and wetlands now thrive on the site of a former cigarette factory.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
May 17, 2024

Big, smoggy Bangkok gets a badly needed breath of fresh air

In the heart of a megacity, an industrial site has been turned into an oasis for residents, as well as birds, bats and mosquito-eating dragonflies.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino announces Brazil as the host of the 2027 Women's World Cup during the 74th FIFA Congress in Bangkok on Friday.
SOCCER / Women's World cup
May 17, 2024

Brazil named as host of 2027 Women's World Cup

FIFA chose to continue its push to expand women's soccer by taking the tournament to South America for the first time.
Oleksandr Usyk fights Daniel Dubois during a title fight in Wroclaw, Poland, on Aug. 26, 2023.
MORE SPORTS / Boxing
May 18, 2024

Oleksandr Usyk fighting for legacy in bid to unify heavyweight title

Usyk says he is driven by legacy, not money, ahead of his unification fight against Tyson Fury.
Supporters of former U.S. President Donald Trump, including Republican North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (center), Republican Florida Rep. Cory Mills (center right) and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy (second from right), listen as Trump speaks after court proceedings ended for the day in his trial at Manhattan criminal court, on Tuesday in New York.
WORLD / Politics
May 18, 2024

Rule No. 1 to be Trump’s running mate: Defend him, but don’t steal the show

Donald Trump’s search is still in its early stages, but he is said to be leaning toward more experienced options who can help the ticket without seizing his precious spotlight.
Ziya Us Salam (left), an associate editor of The Hindu, an English-language newspaper, prays at home with Shan Mohammad, a hafiz who teaches the Quran to one of his daughters, in Noida, India, just outside Delhi, on Aug. 27, 2023.
WORLD / Society
May 20, 2024

Strangers in their own land: Being Muslim in Modi’s India

The premier's rise to national power in 2014 swept a decades-old Hindu nationalist movement from the margins of Indian politics firmly to the center.
Japan's digital trade deficit in 2023 was up about 2.6 times over nine years since 2014, as smartphones have become ubiquitous tools and the digital services sector is dominated by U.S. information technology giants.
BUSINESS / Economy
May 20, 2024

Japan's digital trade deficit continues to expand

The deficit in Japan's balance of payments in digital services continues to expand steadily.
People who have experienced becoming lay judges take part in a meeting to exchange views at the Tokyo District Court on March 6. Japan's lay judge system marks its 15th year on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
May 20, 2024

Number of lay judges falls as Japan marks system's 15th year

While there were more than 10,000 lay judges in the system's first few years, their numbers have fallen to around 6,000 in recent years.
At the factory of 4R Energy Corp. in Namie, Fukushima Prefecture, a lithium-ion electric vehicle battery is disassembled to be reused. Batteries and EVs are among the strategic industries governments around the world aim to support through their industrial policies.
COMMENTARY / Japan / Geoeconomic Briefing
May 20, 2024

Grasping industrial policy in the age of economic security

A new era of industrial policies is structured around three P's: promoting strategic industries, protecting emerging technologies and partnering with like-minded countries.
A scene following an Israeli strike on Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on April 22. Israel has carpet-bombed Gaza, obliterating neighborhoods and targeting hospitals, mosques, schools and camps for displaced people, according to a U.N. report.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 20, 2024

Impunity in Gaza is a threat to the international order

Israel's disregard for human rights and international law in Gaza, and the lack of consequences for such actions, are eroding the liberal international order that Japan relies on.
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin (left) and then-Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu in the Kremlin on May 7. While President Vladimir Putin has no real challengers, powerful actors within his government are vying against each other.
COMMENTARY / World
May 16, 2024

The battle of ministries in Putin’s Russia

Historical parallels suggest that Putin’s top-down approach, like Khrushchev’s de-Stalinization and Gorbachev’s perestroika, risks sparking opposition by causing intra-elite infighting.
Passengers of Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 from London to Singapore, which made an emergency landing in Bangkok, greet family members upon arrival at Changi Airport in Singapore on Wednesday.
WORLD
May 22, 2024

‘It felt like we had crashed,’ a Singapore Air passenger says

With a good two hours left before Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 was due to touch down in Singapore, the plane was suddenly and forcefully shaken.
Service prices, a key component of Japan’s inflation data, may be sturdier than in the past.
BUSINESS / Economy
May 23, 2024

Steady and widening service price rises may spur BOJ’s next move

Service prices, a key component of Japan’s inflation data, may be sturdier than in the past.
Ecuador has sought funding to fight the effects of climate change, including a June 2023 flood that followed heavy rains in Esmeraldas. So far, the developed world has offered the debt-strapped nation more loans than grants.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
May 23, 2024

Rich nations reap climate finance dividend, benefiting from rates and terms

Developed nations have pledged to send $100 billion a year to poorer countries to aid adaptation, but money from the deals is being funneled back into rich economies.
Ukrainian serviceman Mykola, 42, jammer specialist of the "Achilles" drone battalion of the 92nd assault brigade, sets the antenna of a drone signal jamming system on an armored four-wheel-drive vehicle, in an undisclosed location in the Donetsk region on April 30.
WORLD
May 23, 2024

Signal jammers offer hope as drones shape Ukraine's battlefields

More than two years into Russia's invasion, the devices have become essential for Ukrainian forces.
International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan attends a meeting with Venezuela's National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez (not pictured) at the Federal Legislative Palace, in Caracas, Venezuela April 22, 2024.
WORLD / Politics
May 23, 2024

Why a prosecutor went public with arrest warrant requests for Hamas and Israeli leaders

ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan accused Netanyahu and his defense minister of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
A worker shovels soil next to irrigation channels and recently planted shoots of Xinjiang poplar at the Yangguan state-backed forest farm, on the edge of the Gobi desert on the outskirts of Dunhuang, China's Gansu province, in 2021.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
May 23, 2024

China's food security dream faces land, soil and water woes

With limited land and water, China will have to sharply increase farming productivity.
Japan's real wages in fiscal 2023 were down for the second straight year, as steady wage growth failed to keep pace with inflation.
BUSINESS / Economy
May 23, 2024

Japan's fiscal 2023 real wages show sharpest drop in nine years

Real wages were down for the second straight year, as steady wage growth failed to keep pace with inflation.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi speaks at a campaign rally for his Bharatiya Janata party in Chandrapur, India, on April 8.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
May 24, 2024

Modi’s 400-seat dream in doubt as India opposition gains steam

Party insiders, opposition members and analysts who have traveled across India to speak to voters say there’s little evidence of a "Modi wave.”
The Japanese government updated its English education guidelines in 2017 to emphasize communication over grammar and memorization. Public school teachers are incredibly busy, however, which means schools haven’t been able to implement changes uniformly. Private and alternative schools are attempting to remedy this.
LIFE / Language / Longform
May 27, 2024

The language of opportunity: Bilingual education is on the rise in Japan

Stuck with a reputation for poor English, Japan is pushing its next generation to be bilingual. Privately run schools are seeing the benefits.

Longform

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