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Participants hold a giant rainbow flag during a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Pride Parade in Hong Kong
WORLD / Society
Oct 25, 2023

How nations allow or restrict legal gender change

A small number of countries have made it easier for transgender people to change their legal gender, while other nations have restricted such changes.
A daughter of Palestinian man Ali Daba shows her bracelet at their shelter in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, on Tuesday
WORLD / Society
Oct 26, 2023

Gaza families wear ID bracelets to avoid burial in mass graves

With so many bodies, Palestinians in Gaza are burying the unidentified dead with a number instead of a name, residents say.
People react as Palestinians search for casualties at the site of an Israeli strike on a residential building in Gaza City, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 26, 2023

Israel increasingly isolated as fury grows over Gaza bombardment

Israelis see the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas in context not of their treatment of Palestinians but as an extension of anti-Semitic assaults over centuries.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Oct 26, 2023

Violations of electric kick scooter rules on rise in Japan

Cases of violation in Tokyo for which the police took action came to 1,811 in the July-September period.
Sections of the forests in Colville, Washington, have already been thinned, allowing trees to grow less densely and reducing the risk for wildfire.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Oct 26, 2023

How to prevent forest fires by building cities with more wood

Not everyone is convinced mass timber will help forest health.
Demonstrators at a rally near the U.N. headquarters in support of the Hostage and Missing Families Forum, a group working to advocate for hostages kidnapped from Israel, in New York on Tuesday
WORLD / Politics
Oct 26, 2023

Qatar envoys pressing Hamas to release civilian hostages: sources

The talks are limited to civilians, with Hamas describing captive soldiers as strategic assets the group aims to exchange for concessions from Israel.
The armed suspect in a shooting in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday. At least 22 people have been reported killed and dozens injured in the city, U.S. media has reported, citing police.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Oct 26, 2023

At least 22 killed and dozens wounded in Maine shootings

If the death toll of 22 is confirmed, the massacre would be the deadliest in the United States since at least August 2019.
Servers inside Huawei's factory campus in Dongguan, Guangdong province, China, in March 2019
BUSINESS / Tech
Oct 26, 2023

China swaps Western tech for domestic options as U.S. cracks down

The telecom and financial sectors are considered the next focus for the drive, with digital payments seen as particularly vulnerable to Western hacking.
Israeli soldiers gather around a tank near the border with the Gaza Strip on Oct. 15. The IDF is preparing to conduct a ground offensive into the Palestinian territory.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 26, 2023

When history rhymes: Are we back in 2003, at the dawn of the Iraq War?

Given the parallels between the Israeli position today and the U.S. invasion of Iraq a decade ago, history can offer important lessons.
The simplest option for many Japanese industries facing labor shortages might be to do what the taxi sector is doing — keep people in the workforce longer.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 26, 2023

Octogenarian taxi drivers to the labor-crunch rescue

An option for many Japanese industries facing labor shortages might be to do what the taxi sector is doing — keep people in the workforce longer.
Shibuya Mayor Ken Hasebe speaks during an interview at his office on Oct. 19.
JAPAN / Society
Oct 26, 2023

Can Shibuya's mayor turn his ward into a global icon?

For Mayor Ken Hasebe, reining in Halloween revelers is just one step on the way to transforming Shibuya.
A banner displayed at the entrance of Shibuya Ward’s Center Street makes clear that authorities do not want Halloween revelers to roam the streets as has become the custom.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Oct 27, 2023

Why deal with the crowds when you can have a ‘mundane Halloween’ online?

People are busy thinking up costumes at Halloween, so will yours be flashy and outrageous? Well, an online trend proves "bland" can be just as fun.
People walk next to debris left after the passage of Hurricane Otis in Acapulco, Guerrero State, Mexico, on Thursday.
WORLD
Oct 27, 2023

At least 27 killed by 'disastrous' Hurricane Otis

Mexican authorities said Otis was the most powerful storm ever to strike Mexico's Pacific coast.
It’s hard to talk about space-based solar — that is, transmitting the energy — without conjuring images of a death ray. But the team at the California Institute of Technology says the power density of the beam would be comparable to the power density of sunlight.
ENVIRONMENT / Earth science
Oct 27, 2023

Beam solar energy from space? These scientists say yes

The hurdles that have grounded space-based solar in the past aren’t merely technical, they’re also financial.
Inagaki, now 90, says a pivotal trip to the United States in 1969 changed not only his fashion sense from preppy to hippie but also his approach to music.
CULTURE / Music
Oct 27, 2023

Saxophonist Jiro Inagaki’s golden age of jazz rock

“WaJazz Legends: Jiro Inagaki” highlights the musician’s eclectic oeuvre, which has transformed a sidetrack artist into a pillar of Japanese jazz.
The interiors of what the Israeli military say is a cross-border attack tunnel dug from Gaza to Israel, on the Israeli side of the Gaza Strip border near Kissufim in 2018.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2023

The Hamas tunnel city beneath Gaza — a hidden frontline for Israel

Hamas has different kinds of tunnels running beneath the sandy 360-square-kilometer Gaza Strip — including attack, smuggling, and storage burrows.
Cardboard hearts with messages are hung in the downtown area in Lewiston, Maine, on Thursday, in the aftermath of a mass shooting.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Oct 27, 2023

Maine's second largest city faces aftermath of mass shooting

Maine Gov. Janet Mills said the shooting had undermined Maine’s reputation as one of the safest states in the country.
A soldier installs an Israeli flag on a tank during a military drill near Israel's border with Lebanon in northern Israel, on Thursday
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2023

U.S. strikes Syrian facilities after attacks by Iran-backed militia

U.S. President Joe Biden ordered strikes on two facilities in Syria following attacks on U.S. troops in the past week, the Pentagon said, warning the U.S. will take additional measures if attacks by Iran's proxies continue.
An employee operates at a production facility of Zaporizhstal Iron and Steel Works, in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, this month.
BUSINESS / Companies / ANALYSIS
Oct 27, 2023

Ukraine's once-mighty steel sector choked by export blockade

Until producers can get steel to markets via the Black Sea, where Russia continues to pose a threat to shipping, there is little prospect of recovery.
The Khmelnytskyi nuclear power plant near the city of Netishyn, Khmelnytskyi region, Ukraine, in August.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 27, 2023

As winter nears, Ukraine braces for attacks on energy grid

Russian drone strikes near a nuclear power plant in western Ukraine this week have revived anxiety among officials and civilians.
In September, the Sapporo Convention Center played host to the first Adventure Travel World Summit ever to take place in Asia.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 28, 2023

Travel pros warn against diluting ‘Japaneseness’

“Don’t dilute the Japaneseness, because that’s what makes it special,” said one travel expert. “We want to come to Japan.”
While inaka sushi still uses dashi broth to flavor some ingredients, it's possible to make this sushi 100% vegan.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Oct 29, 2023

Sushi sans fish: How rural traditions led to vegan-friendly rolls

Leave the salmon behind with “inaka sushi,” which trades raw fish for mushrooms, ginger and other fresh veggies.
Major supermarket chain Daiei opened a checkout-free, walk-through store in the CeeU Yokohama mall on Friday.
BUSINESS / Tech
Oct 27, 2023

At new Japan supermarket outlet, high tech runs the store

The system replaces cash registers with a network of cameras, weight sensors and a smartphone app.
A poster bearing a photo of Israeli hostage Noga Weiss is displayed during a gathering called Balloons of Hope in Sydney on Friday.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 27, 2023

Israelis weren't the only victims of Hamas' attack

All nations should send a clear message to Hamas and its supporters that all the hostages must be immediately released.
Plaintiffs, lawyers and supporters march to the Tokyo District Court on Nov. 30, the same day the court ruled that Japan’s lack of legal protections for same-sex couples is unconstitutional.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 27, 2023

Japan's 'failed' same-sex marriage lawsuits can still propel reform

Even unsuccessful cases challenging Japan’s failure to recognize same-sex marriage have gotten courts to acknowledge a constitutional problem.
Climate activists demand that the World Bank stop fossil fuel financing on the first day of the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Marrakech, Morocco, on Oct. 9.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 27, 2023

Telling countries not to be poor is bad climate advice

As developing nations bear the brunt of the costs of climate change; the world's richer states need to pay up.
Christopher Nolan's film about the creator of the atomic bomb, "Oppenheimer," was released in theaters worldwide this summer and received mostly strong reviews. However, distributors still have not announced whether the film will be shown in Japan's cinemas.
CULTURE / Film
Oct 28, 2023

Will Japan ever see 'Oppenheimer' screened in its cinemas?

Christopher Nolan’s film about the creator of the atomic bomb still doesn't have a Japan release date. There’s more than one possible reason for that.
Takuya Matsunaga (right), who lost his wife and daughter in a 2019 crash in Tokyo's Ikebukuro district, attends a news conference on Friday along with his father-in-law, Yoshinori Uehara.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 27, 2023

Ex-Japan bureaucrat ordered to pay damages over fatal 2019 crash

Kozo Iizuka had already been sentenced to five years in prison, after the car he was driving crashed into Mana Matsunaga, 31, and her daughter Riko, 3.
A woman walks past newly unveiled lettering that references the Oct. 29 Itaewon crush in Seoul. A more fully developed memorial was later built to commemorate the event and the more than 150 people who lost their lives.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society / Longform
Oct 27, 2023

One year on, Itaewon's scars remain

A year on from the Itaewon crush, foot traffic in the Seoul neighborhood is picking back up. But what the future of the area is still in doubt.
Samuel Bankman-Fried, founder and CEO of FTX, testifies during a Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington in February 2022.
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 28, 2023

FTX founder admits 'mistakes' but testifies he didn't defraud anyone

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried insisted he did not steal billions of dollars from customers when the cryptocurrency exchange collapsed last year.

Longform

It's back to the classroom for some residents as municipal governments across the country conduct lessons to learn how to use new technologies.
Can aging Japan go digital without leaving anyone behind?