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Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 4, 2015

Mujin Chitai (No Man's Zone)

Director: Toshi Fujiwara Language: Japanese (subtitled in English)
WORLD / Politics
Mar 3, 2015

Obama says Iran must halt key nuclear work for at least a decade

Iran must commit to a verifiable freeze of at least 10 years on sensitive nuclear activity for a landmark atomic deal to be reached, but the odds are still against sealing a final agreement, U.S. President Barack Obama said on Monday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 27, 2015

Video artist Duncan Campbell sees between the lines

When Irish artist Duncan Campbell won the Turner Prize last December, it was met with both high praise and criticism, as often happens with the notoriously controversial event. But perhaps such a difference in perception is appropriate.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 17, 2015

The world is less dangerous than we imagine

The world is a dangerous place and can be even more so by making errors bred by unwarranted pessimism.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / ANALYSIS
Feb 17, 2015

China's defense budget expected to defy economic lilt

President Xi Jinping is expected to authorize robust defense spending for this year despite China's slowing economy, determined to strengthen the country's armed capabilities amid growing unease in Beijing at Washington's renewed focus on Asia.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 15, 2015

Kerry's international order challenges disorder

U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry disagrees with cynics who say the international order is unraveling. He sees the world working together as hard as ever to end the Ebola pandemic, reduce nuclear proliferation, achieve an accord on climate change and curb strife in Africa and the Mideast.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / A TASTE OF HOME
Feb 10, 2015

Singapore food fling provides 'messy and satisfying' feast

It's Friday night and I'm staring death in the face. The face in question happens to belong to a red snapper, and it's peeking out from the dark depths of powerful tamarind broth shimmering with crimson chili oil.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 9, 2015

Lowering the bar for economic performance

Regardless of how much progressives try to play up the U.S. economic recovery by lowering the bar for perfornance, the lingering anemia is astonishing, given the plummeting energy prices.
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS / TYSON-DOUGLAS SHOCKER REVISITED
Feb 6, 2015

Lampley remembers historic fight in Tokyo

Second in a series
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 5, 2015

Facebook diplomacy on the Ukrainian front

Dramatic dispatches of diplomacy from a Ukrainian tank officer underscore social media's ability to keep soldiers and their commanders on Ukraine's eastern battlefield in touch with friends and families.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 2, 2015

Welfare state rises as exceptionalism declines

America's national character will have to be changed if progressives are going to implement their agenda to increase the size of the entitlement state.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 31, 2015

Diplomatic blundering on hostages and history

Japan's latest hostage crisis has exposed shortcomings in Japan's public diplomacy and raises questions about the advice Prime Minister Shinzo Abe received in publicly announcing $200 million in humanitarian aid to help those displaced by conflict with the Islamic State group.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 30, 2015

Japan's hope may be found in its hinterlands

As the European Central Bank prepares to inject up to a trillion euros into Europe's faltering economy, it would be wise to study Japan's lackluster experience with massive quantitative easing.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 24, 2015

Can the DPJ reinvigorate Japanese democracy?

Columbia University's Gerald Curtis recently wrote, "It is a sad commentary on Japan's politics that after nearly 70 years of democracy a competitive party system has all but disintegrated."
COMMENTARY
Jan 22, 2015

Hindu zealots drag down India's great-power destiny

A tussle is going on between the cultural and economic right wings of India's ruling party. The former helped to bring the Bharatiya Janata Party to power, but only the latter can ensure it retains power by using it for the common good.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 21, 2015

Editors are killing U.S. political cartooning

The Charlie Hebdo massacre couldn't have happened in the U.S. because no American newspaper employs more than one political cartoonist, and most have none.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / LABOR PAINS
Jan 21, 2015

Forty years after Zainichi labor case victory, is Japan turning back the clock?

Efforts against nationality-based discrimination in Japan have made zero progress in the four decades since a landmark court case against Hitachi.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 20, 2015

Abe using overseas trips to test waters in preparation for WWII 70th anniversary statement

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is promoting Japan as a postwar peace-builder as he tests the waters for a statement marking the 70th anniversary of its World War II defeat that risks irritating China and South Korea.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 12, 2015

Koreans need to stay outraged over 'nut-rage'

The Heather Cho kerfuffle — involving 'nut-rage' aboard a Korean Air fligh — offers the South Korean news media a chance to right a political system that has veered off course.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jan 10, 2015

Yoshitaka Amano: The World Beyond Your Imagination

Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 6, 2015

Give Kim the Castro treatment

The Obama administration should not reward North Korea's brutal Kim dynasty for its bad behavior. But as in Cuba, openness is more likely to erode the foundations of the North Korean regime than isolation.
Japan Times
Figure Skating / ICE TIME
Jan 2, 2015

Machida's decision to quit both selfish and untimely

Tatsuki Machida's sudden retirement at the Japan nationals in Nagano last week came as a shock to just about everybody.
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Jan 1, 2015

Readers' letters: Roppongi, Ferguson, 'Massan,' Julien Blanc and more

Some emails received in response to Community articles at the tail end of 2014.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 28, 2014

Hacking of low brow movie raises high stakes issues

The movie 'The Interview,' featuring the supposed blowing up of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, is a sad commentary on the idiocies of our troubled times. It should not have been made.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 28, 2014

Cuba Derangement Syndrome strikes again

Cuba Derangement Syndrome, a recurring fever, afflicts U.S. senators and others who argue that U.S. diplomatic relations and economic interactions lead to legitimizing Cuba's regime.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Dec 27, 2014

The Woman in the Dunes

Certain books must be read, even with the knowledge that the reading will be painful. Kobo Abe's masterpiece "The Woman in the Dunes" is one such book. Called an "existential fable," it is no surprise that Abe's favorite writers were Franz Kafka, Friedrich Nietzsche and Edgar Allan Poe.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Dec 24, 2014

2014: New horizons opened up in Japan's theater world

Looking back over the past 12 months in Japan's theater world, it's clear that one encouraging trend is a lessening of the capital's dominance.

Longform

People in cities across Japan will pop into their local convenience store for any number of products they believe will help them with a night of drinking.
Hangover cures are everywhere in Japan — but do they work?