Search - new

 
 
For one night in Tokyo last month, Daniel Calvert (left) and Quique Dacosta brought their wildly different culinary styles together into a remarkable service.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Oct 6, 2024

A meeting of Michelin minds at Tokyo's Sezanne

Daniel Calvert says no to most requests for pop-ups at two-Michelin-starred Sezanne — except when the chance to work with three-starred Quique Dacosta came up.
Diego Garcia — the largest island in the Chagos Archipelago and the site of a major military base used by Britain and the United States — is seen in this undated image the U.S. Navy provided.
WORLD
Oct 4, 2024

U.K. cedes Chagos Island sovereignty to Mauritius and keeps air base

Britain's deal also could pave the way for people displaced decades ago to return home.
Digital minister Taro Kono attends an Upper House committee session in June. The cautioning of Kono over his use of his smartphone to respond to a question in the Upper House last November attracted significant attention and led to a bipartisan call for digital transformation within parliament.
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 4, 2024

Digitalization advances gradually in Japan's parliament

Improvement plans have been adopted but certain practices, such as the use of tablets at the podium during plenary sessions, remain off-limits.
A tea field in Makinohara, the birthplace of Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda, in August. The city in Shizuoka Prefecture, which once thrived on a now-declining tea industry, exemplifies disparities between Japan's struggling rural areas and its bustling megacities.
BUSINESS / Economy
Oct 4, 2024

In Bank of Japan chief's birthplace, Ueda's policy puzzle is laid bare

Makinohara's mayor says the Shizuoka Prefecture surf town is not keeping pace with Japan's broader recovery.
Falcons quarterback Kirk Cousins passes against the Buccaneers in Atlanta on Thursday. The Falcons won 36-30 in overtime.
MORE SPORTS
Oct 4, 2024

Kirk Cousins goes over 500 yards to lift Falcons to win over Buccaneers in overtime

Cousins completed 42 of 58 passes for 509 yards and four touchdowns.
Japan Coast Guard officials search for missing people after the fatal sinking of the Kazu I tour boat off the Shiretoko Peninsula in Hokkaido.
JAPAN
Oct 4, 2024

Japan to require passenger ships sailing in cold waters to carry life rafts

The move follows the deadly sinking of the Kazu I tour boat off Hokkaido in April 2022.
Ayami Sato is one of the best female players in baseball history.
BASEBALL
Oct 3, 2024

Japan great Ayami Sato helps shine light on women's baseball in new documentary

Ayami Sato has helped Japan win six straight Women's Baseball World Cup titles.
The Japanese market for secondhand items is growing, with more consumers using flea market apps such as Mercari.
BUSINESS
Oct 4, 2024

Japan's used goods market is expanding, but that may hurt its GDP

The trend is seen as friendly to consumers and the environment, but it can have the undesirable consequence of pushing down the country's GDP.
Lassana Diarra in Paris in May last year. Diarra was at the center of a high-profile case that could shake up the transfer market in European soccer.
SOCCER
Oct 4, 2024

Top EU court rules against FIFA in key transfer market ruling

In a landmark decision, the EU's top court has ruled some international soccer rules regulating player transfers are contrary to the bloc's laws.
Keidanren chief Masakazu Tokura (center, left) presents the business lobby group's policy requests to Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba alongside the Japan Association of Corporate Executives' Takeshi Niinami (far left) and Ken Kobayashi of the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, on Friday in Tokyo.
BUSINESS
Oct 4, 2024

Japan's three major business lobbies submit policy requests to Ishiba

Ishiba told the three business leaders that ending the Japanese economy's deflationary state is a top priority.
Smoke billows over Beirut's southern suburbs after a strike as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon, on Saturday.
WORLD
Oct 5, 2024

Israeli strike hits north Lebanon as raids pummel Beirut suburbs

A source said a Hamas official, his wife and two children were killed in the strike on a Palestinian refugee camp in Tripoli.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba delivers his inaugural policy address to parliament in Tokyo on Friday.
JAPAN / Politics
Oct 5, 2024

LDP to endorse 'slush fund' lawmakers in general election

Opposition parties are turning up the heat on Ishiba, who had earlier signaled his intention to take action against those implicated in the scandal.
Sakie Yokota shares her thoughts ahead of her abducted daughter's 60th birthday, on Thursday in Kawasaki.
JAPAN
Oct 5, 2024

Sakie Yokota expresses hopes for a reunion on daughter's 60th birthday

Megumi Yokota was abducted by North Korea in 1977 at the age of 13. If a reunion is realized, "I just hope to hug her silently," Sakie said.
Men run for cover after an Israeli strike on the Mreijeh neighborhood in Beirut's southern suburbs on Friday.
WORLD / ANALYSIS
Oct 5, 2024

Countdown to Middle East war? How the region can step back from the brink

Brakes remain to halt a regional fall into a wider conflagration that would lock Israel and Tehran into escalating conflict and suck in other nations.
The Bank of Japan headquarters in Tokyo. Worries about the implications of further BOJ tightening against a global backdrop of easing were again on display this week, with new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba saying Japan wasn’t ready for more rate hikes yet.
BUSINESS / Markets
Oct 5, 2024

Stepped-up global easing risks making it harder for BOJ to hike

Worries about the implications of further BOJ tightening against a global backdrop of easing were again on display this week.
Raymonde Desiree, a member of the Chagossian community living in Crawley, south of London.
WORLD / Society
Oct 5, 2024

Chagos diaspora angry at lack of input on islands' fate

Britain will transfer sovereignty of Chagos Islands to Mauritius, and many Chagossians are angry that they were not given a say in the islands' fate.
Cameron Lew, who makes music under the name Ginger Root, recently released “Shinbangumi,” an album that was influenced by the glimmering pop echoes of Japan in the 1980s as well as the nerviness of Devo, the loose rock-pop of Hall & Oates and even Haruomi Hosono’s ’70s explorations of exotica.
CULTURE / Music
Oct 5, 2024

Ginger Root expands on effervescent retro sound

New release "Shinbangumi" comes after a whirlwind year for the American artist who blends glittering pop echoes of 1980s Japan with a mish-mash of Western influences.
Japanese film director Kiyoshi Kurosawa gestures as he poses for photos during a press conference at the 29th Busan International Film Festival.
CULTURE / Film
Oct 5, 2024

Japan's 'master of horror' Kiyoshi Kurosawa highlights 'B-movie' appeal

The director, who received the Busan International Film Festival's Filmmaker of the Year Award on Wednesday, said he'd like to see more artists explore genre cinema.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba inspects the area around a morning market, which was heavily damaged in the Jan. 1 earthquake, in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, on Saturday.
JAPAN
Oct 5, 2024

Torrential rain in Noto Peninsula to be designated a severe disaster, Ishiba says

Ishiba announced the plan during a visit to areas damaged heavily by the rain and the powerful Jan. 1 earthquake.
People search for survivors and the bodies of victims after an Israeli bombardment in the southern Gaza Strip on Oct. 26, 2023.
WORLD
Oct 5, 2024

Emails show early U.S. concerns over Gaza offensive and risk of Israeli war crimes

The emails show the Biden administration’s struggle to balance internal concerns over rising deaths in Gaza with its public support for Jerusalem.
Israeli soldiers patrol near the Israel-Lebanon border on Friday amid ongoing hostilities with Hezbollah.
WORLD
Oct 6, 2024

Israel on alert ahead of Hamas attack anniversary

The alert came with Israel engaged in an intensifying war with the Lebanese Hezbollah group, which officials said would be hit "without concession or respite."
People demonstrate in New York on Saturday.
WORLD
Oct 6, 2024

Thousands march around the world for cease-fire ahead of Oct. 7 anniversary

Pro-Palestinian supporters gathered in cities in Europe, Africa and the Americas to demand an end to the conflict, which has killed nearly 42,000 people in Gaza.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda ahead of their meeting on Wednesday. Ishiba's comment after the meeting that he doesn't believe Japan needs an additional interest rate hike has surprised the financial market.
BUSINESS / Markets / FOCUS
Oct 6, 2024

Ishiba's U-turn on interest rates surprises market

The market is being perplexed by the statement by Ishiba, who had been critical of Abenomics.
Police in Osaka Prefecture arrested four people early last month for allegedly defrauding a "spot work" platform operator of about ¥680,000.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 6, 2024

Scammers in Japan take advantage of popularity of ‘spot work’

Police in Osaka Prefecture arrested four people early last month for allegedly defrauding a platform operator of about ¥680,000.
A damaged road in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, on Jan. 6, after a major earthquake struck the area on New Year's Day
ENVIRONMENT / Earth science / OUR PLANET
Oct 6, 2024

Important tool or alarmism? Japan experts split on megaquake advisories.

Supporters say the advisories are about reducing risk, but critics see a system that isn’t based on science and one in which the cons outweigh the pros.
An Israeli aerial assault on Iran’s nuclear sites and other targets would be a very complex operation, involving dozens of F-15s, in-flight refueling and the targeting of numerous known and undisclosed facilities.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 6, 2024

An Israel-Iran war could turn into a deadly nightmare

Israel is fully justified in wanting to hit back at Iran. Yet hating your enemies too much can cloud your judgment.
Damaged homes in Dekle Beach, Florida, after Hurricane Helene roared through the region last month
WORLD
Oct 6, 2024

Florida faces new storm threat as region reels from Helene

Tropical Storm Milton, with winds of 40 miles per hour, is forecast to build into at least a Category 3 hurricane.
Debris covers part of Beirut's southern suburbs in the aftermath of Israeli strikes on Sunday.
WORLD
Oct 6, 2024

Intense Israeli bombing rocks Beirut ahead of war anniversary

Israeli forces were on high alert ahead of Monday's anniversary of Hamas's October 7 attack, which sparked the war.
The units under construction at Jera's liquefied natural gas fired power plant inside the company's Anegasaki Thurmal Power Station in Ichihara, Chiba Prefecture, in June 2022
JAPAN
Oct 6, 2024

Japan and South Korea to expand initiative to cut methane emissions

Methane's greenhouse effect is believed to be more than 20 times that of carbon dioxide. Leaks of methane from gas fields are a major issue that need to be dealt with.
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a neighborhood in Beirut's southern suburbs late on Sunday.
WORLD
Oct 7, 2024

Israel bombs Lebanon and Gaza ahead of marking one year since attacks

Israel's defense minister also declared all options were being looked at for retaliation against arch-enemy Iran.

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone.
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan