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Democratic Party for the People chief Yuichiro Tamaki wants to the tax-free annual income ceiling raised to ¥1.78 million ($11,410).
BUSINESS / Economy
Nov 14, 2024

Japan’s key political issue rests on an enduring economic myth

Economists cast doubts on the Democratic Party for the People's push for raising the tax-free income threshold — its key demand to the ruling coalition for its support.
The Azerbaijan pavilion during the COP29 climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Monday
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Nov 14, 2024

Hopes pinned on low-key COP29 to thrash out climate-finance details

The Baku summit aims to reach new agreement for climate-related transfers from rich to poor countries, intended to replace a $100 billion annual target set in 2009.
Hackers infiltrated the networks of multiple U.S. telecommunications companies to steal customer call records and compromise the communications belonging to a "limited number” of people in government and politics, officials said.
WORLD
Nov 14, 2024

U.S. accuses China of vast cyberespionage against telecoms

The hackers infiltrated the networks of multiple telecommunications companies to steal customer call records and compromise communications.
Princess Yuriko in May 2023
JAPAN
Nov 15, 2024

Princess Yuriko, sister-in-law of Emperor Showa, dies at 101

The oldest living member of the imperial family, Princess Yuriko died due to natural causes.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. speaks in Phoenix, Arizona, on August 23, 2024. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump announced on Thursday that he is nominating Kennedy to be the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 15, 2024

Vaccine skeptic RFK Jr. vows to 'Make America Healthy Again'

Donald Trump announced he would nominate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to become the next secretary of Health and Human Services.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with House Republicans at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Washington in November. The president-elect is rewarding his staunchest allies with plum roles.
WORLD / Politics / ANALYSIS
Nov 15, 2024

In choosing his team, Trump opts for personal ties and TV chops

It contrasts with his first presidency when he ended up with members on his team with whom he had no prior working relationship and no level of trust.
A Type 2 diabetes patient gives himself an insulin shot. In 2022, there were around 828 million people aged 18 years and older with Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes worldwide, a new study found.
WORLD / Science & Health
Nov 15, 2024

More than 800 million adults have diabetes globally, study suggests

The study in The Lancet found the global prevalence of diabetes has doubled since 1990 to 14% from around 7%.
Shannon Turner, who is often in and out of the hospital due to waterfall effects related to the interplay between long COVID, psoriatic arthritis, antiphospholipid antibody syndrome and autoimmune diseases, sits up on a hospital bed in Philadelphia, in May 2023.
WORLD / Science & Health
Nov 15, 2024

Many long COVID patients adjust to slim recovery odds as world moves on

Recent scientific studies suggest the longer someone is sick, the lower their chances of making a full recovery.
A University of Lisbon banner reads "From Lisbon to the World." Talent flight to wealthier countries of the north is a problem Portugal shares with several others in southern and central Europe.
WORLD / Society
Nov 15, 2024

Borderless Europe fights brain drain as talent heads north

Workers moving to other nations within the bloc exacerbates regional labor shortages and deprives poorer countries of tax revenues.
While baldness can often be the butt of jokes in Japan, it can also be a powerfully freeing act of self-acceptance for those struggling with hair loss.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Nov 16, 2024

Thinning up top? Hair loss in Japan is not the end.

Among Asian countries, Japan has the highest rate of alopecia at around 26%, as well as 7.8% of women experiencing some form of hair thinning.
Aomori-based writer JJ Carter presented on tabletop gaming as creative inspiration for building characters and narratives.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Nov 18, 2024

In Fukushima, a weekend of prose, poetry and translation

The latest edition of the Japan Writers Conference was a friendly forum for anglophone writers to connect and converse.
A Ukrainian flag flies over the site of the former monument to Russian Empress Catherine the Great in Odesa, Ukraine.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 15, 2024

Ukraine’s post-colonial future

If the Ukrainians are truly fighting for us, it is because they are fighting the last battle against European imperialism.
Japanese companies lack the agility needed for the digital transformation, a new report says.
BUSINESS / Economy
Nov 15, 2024

Japan ranked 31st in digital competitiveness, 92nd for English skills

In the 2024 EF English Proficiency Index, Japan was ranked 92nd, down from 87 the previous year. It was its worst showing yet.
The facade of the Okinawa Prefectural Museum & Art Museum graces the cover of Paul Tulett’s new book “Brutalist Japan: A Photographic Tour of Post-War Japanese Architecture.”
CULTURE / Books
Nov 16, 2024

Brutal beauty worth saving from the wrecking ball

Paul Tulett advocates for preserving concrete Brutalist architecture in his new book “Brutalist Japan.”
Karoline Leavitt waves during a campaign event at the New England Sports Center in Derry, New Hampshire, in October 2023.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 16, 2024

Trump names Karoline Leavitt as White House press secretary

"Karoline is smart, tough, and has proven to be a highly effective communicator,” Trump said in a statement on Friday.
Cooling towers at the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Middletown, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 15. One reactor will be brought back online in 2028.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Nov 16, 2024

Nuclear power was once shunned at climate talks. Now, it’s a rising star.

Over the past few years, interest in nuclear power has steadily grown in tandem with concern about global warming.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump attends a meeting with House Republicans at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Washington on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 16, 2024

G20 set to back climate goals and global trade in message to Trump

Group of 20 leaders meeting in Brazil next week are set to show unity on climate action and global trade rules.
Jiro Hamazumi (right), deputy secretary general of the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations, holds a news conference on Thursday.
JAPAN
Nov 16, 2024

Nihon Hidankyo's crowdfunding campaign achieves initial goal on first day

The amount of donations collected under the campaign surpassed ¥10 million shortly past 11 p.m. Friday Japan time. Donors reached about 1,400 people.
Residents from coastal areas take shelter at an evacuation center in Legaspi City, south of Manila, on Saturday, ahead of Super Typhoon Man-yi's landfall.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 16, 2024

Tens of thousands flee as Super Typhoon Man-yi nears Philippines

Around 255,000 people have fled their homes ahead of Super Typhoon Man-yi, which is expected to make landfall later Saturday or early Sunday.
Kenyan climate scientist Joyce Kimutai during the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP29) in Baku on Friday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Nov 16, 2024

World not listening to us, laments Kenyan climate scientist at COP29

"If the world was listening to science, maybe we wouldn't be doing these COPs," the 36-year-old Kenyan climate scientist said.
U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Lima on Saturday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Nov 17, 2024

Trump's shadow looms as Xi and Biden hold final meeting

The talks focused broadly on efforts by Washington and Beijing to ease the countries’ tense relationship.
A woman holds a bouquet of flowers on Wednesday as she heads toward a sports center where a deadly car attack took place in Zhuhai, China. On Saturday, one man was arrested after eight people were killed and 17 others wounded in a knife attack at a vocational school in the eastern city of Yixing, in Jiangsu province.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Nov 17, 2024

At least eight dead and 17 hurt in China school knife attack

The suspect — a 21-year-old former student at the vocational school in the city of Yixing — was arrested, police said.
Members of the Indigenous People Association stage a protest to demand action on climate change, holding cutouts of U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the waters of Botafogo Bay, ahead of the Group of 20 summit in Rio de Janeiro on Saturday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Nov 17, 2024

Biden weighs fossil fuel finance curbs that could outlast Trump

Landing the deal is seen as essential to deliver on a promise Biden made during his first year in the White House.
Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike in Beirut on Nov. 13.
WORLD
Nov 17, 2024

Israel pummels south Beirut as Hezbollah targets Haifa area

Israel's military reported a "heavy rocket barrage" on Haifa and said a synagogue was hit, wounding two civilians.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer known for his anti-science stances, lacks public health experience and has a history of promoting harmful conspiracy theories, such as anti-vaccine activism.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 17, 2024

RFK Jr.’s junk science will put every American at risk

His promotion of bizarre conspiracy theories could turn the government into an “accelerant for misinformation.”
Super Typhoon Man-yi making landfall on the island of Luzon in the Philippines.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 17, 2024

Super Typhoon Man-yi batters Philippines' most populous island

Man-yi was still packing maximum sustained winds of 185 kilometers per hour (115 miles per hour) after making its first landfall late Saturday on Catanduanes island.
Ukrainian emergency service personnel remove fragments of a downed Russian hypersonic missile which hit a five-story residential building in Kyiv on Sunday.
WORLD
Nov 17, 2024

Russia pounds Ukraine's power grid in 'massive' air strike

Ukrainians have been bracing for weeks for an attack on the hobbled energy system, fearing crippling damage that would cause long blackouts as winter sets.
Motohiko Saito makes a speech following his reelection Sunday as governor of Hyogo Prefecture, a position he lost after the prefectural assembly unanimously passed a no-confidence vote against him in September.
JAPAN / Politics
Nov 18, 2024

Hyogo governor reelected following ouster by assembly over harassment

Motohiko Saito garnered popular support despite strong opposition from political parties and a majority of Hyogo’s city mayors.
Rice fields in the town of Ozu, Kumamoto Prefecture. The water-filled paddies glistening under the sun is a symbol of a long-running effort to preserve the prefecture’s groundwater.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability / OUR PLANET
Nov 17, 2024

Japan's chipmaking rush pressures Kumamoto's special water supply

TSMC and others hope that support for existing projects and proper wastewater management can avoid undermining water development efforts lauded by the U.N.
Kim Jong Un shakes hands with Vladimir Putin in 2019.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 18, 2024

North Korea may end up sending Putin 100,000 troops for war

North Korea sending troops to join Russia’s fight against Ukraine has alarmed Kyiv’s allies, who say it risks exacerbating Europe’s largest conflict since World War II.

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A man offers prayers at Hebikubo Shrine in Tokyo's Shinagawa Ward. The shrine is one of several across the country dedicated to the snake.
Shed your skin and reinvent yourself in the Year of the Snake