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People demonstrate against U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in Panama City on Tuesday as the country marks the 25th anniversary of the United States' handover of the interoceanic Panama Canal.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 2, 2025

MAGA goes to Panama

The Panama Canal was an American idea and the U.S. has had difficulty letting go of it ever since.
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson holds the gavel after winning reelection to his post at the Capitol in Washington on Friday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 4, 2025

Johnson reelected as U.S. House speaker after putting down GOP revolt

Republican U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson persuaded enough holdouts on the right to keep his post, but the vote reflected the steep challenge he faces.
A 2024 Toyota Prius Prime during the 2024 New York International Auto Show in New York last March
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 4, 2025

U.S. new car sales rose to five-year high in 2024, helped by hybrids

Sales continued to rise from their pandemic lows, bolstered by replenished inventories, higher incentives and surging demand for hybrid vehicles.
Police officers on Bourbon Street, hours after a man drove a pickup truck into people in the French Quarter of New Orleans, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 4, 2025

How the Islamic State radicalizes people today

On New Year’s Day, a man with an Islamic State group flag killed at least 14 people when he drove into a crowd in New Orleans.
An Israeli soldier sits atop a tank as it drives into the U.N.-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, on Dec. 13.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 5, 2025

U.S. plans $8 billion arms sale to Israel

Some of the munitions deliveries could be furnished through current U.S. stock, while the majority would take up to several years to deliver.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni
WORLD / Politics
Jan 5, 2025

Italian Prime Minister Meloni meets with Trump at his Florida resort

The Italian leader's trip comes days before she is to meet U.S. President Joe Biden during a visit to Rome from Thursday to Jan. 12.
Britain's Reform U.K. party leader Nigel Farage speaks during a news conference in London on Nov. 28.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 6, 2025

Musk turns on U.K.'s Farage, saying he should quit as Reform party chief

The Tesla CEO, a close ally of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, said the Reform U.K. party leader "doesn’t have what it takes."
Hogwarts Castle at Universal Studios Hollywood in Universal City, California. There are influential American works of fantasy like “The Wizard of Oz” and “American Gods,” but they lack the cohesive, enduring impact of European counterparts such as the “Harry Potter” and “The Chronicles of Narnia” series.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 6, 2025

America needs a 'Great American Fantasy'

There is a lack of a distinctly "Great American Fantasy" in literature and popular culture.
A hole, several meters wide, on the edge of the tarmac at Miyazaki Airport in Miyazaki, after an unexploded World War II U.S. bomb blew up less than a minute after a passenger jet taxied past on Oct. 2
JAPAN
Jan 12, 2025

Timed detonator from dud shell likely behind airport blast

Experts have identified a bomb that detonated at Miyazaki Airport as one of the explosives dropped by U.S. forces during World War II.
Denmark's Foreign Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen answers journalists' questions, in which he also commented on U.S.President-elect Trump's latest statements about Denmark and Greenland, in Copenhagen on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 9, 2025

Greenland independence is possible but joining the U.S. unlikely, Denmark says

Greenland's leader met with the Danish king a day after Trump's remarks thrust the strategically important island to the top of world headlines.
Migrants queue to board a bus that will take them to a shelter after turning themselves in to agents of Mexico's National Institute of Migration to look for a permit which would allow them to cross the country and reach the northern border with the U.S., in Tapachula, Mexico, on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 9, 2025

Anxious but undeterred, migrants brace for Trump presidency

Trump has pledged tougher border controls and immigration enforcement and to launch a mass deportation operation.
The town of Ilulisat in Greenland in September 2021. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has said he would like to make Greenland part of the United States.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 9, 2025

Why is Trump interested in Greenland?

The U.S. president-elect has said control of the Arctic island is "an absolute necessity" for "purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World."
A beach house is engulfed by the flames of the Palisades fire as seen along the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, California, on Wednesday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Jan 9, 2025

Extreme weather and suburban sprawl fuel LA's wildfires

A prolonged dry spell and strong winds played key roles, though experts say it's too soon to say how much climate change contributed.
Rahm Emanuel professes that the biggest thing he has brought to the U.S.-Japan relationship might be a fresh injection of vitality.
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 9, 2025

Emanuel leaves reform legacy amid historic shifts in U.S.-Japan alliance

The departing U.S. ambassador arguably oversaw the most consequential shift in the U.S.-Japan alliance in decades.
Burned-out homes reduced to rubble by the Eaton Fire are seen in Altadena, California, on Friday.
WORLD
Jan 11, 2025

Los Angeles faces more wildfire evacuations even as fierce winds ease

Fierce winds that have supercharged wildfires sweeping parts of Los Angeles eased Friday, but the largest blaze shifted direction, triggering new evacuation orders.
U.S. Army soldiers with the NATO multinational battle group on the territory of Bulgaria stand in formation with a U.S. flag and an armored vehicle during a visit by NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte at the Novo Selo military ground near Mokren, Bulgaria, on Dec. 19.
WORLD / Politics / ANALYSIS
Jan 11, 2025

NATO won't back Trump's new defense spending target but will raise its sights

A new target is likely to be agreed at a NATO summit in June, but the key questions are what that new target will be and whether it will be enough to satisfy Trump.
Pete Hegseth, U.S. secretary of defense nominee for President-elect Donald Trump, arrives for a meeting with Sen. Chuck Grassley, on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 11, 2025

With hearings imminent, partisan fight escalates over Trump Cabinet

Democrats are demanding that Republicans slow consideration of picks for the new administration until they can review background checks.
Fire retardant is dropped as the Palisades Fire grows near Encino Hills, California, on Saturday.
WORLD
Jan 12, 2025

Aerial assault aims to stem Los Angeles fire's eastward spread

Fire officials say that while 11% of the Palisades Fire was now contained, it has so far burned over 22,000 acres (8,900 hectares).
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (left) shakes hands with Indonesia's President Prabowo Subianto after giving a press statement following their meeting at the Presidential Palace in Bogor, Indonesia on Saturday.
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 12, 2025

Ishiba hopes diplomacy will give boost to parliamentary management

As the Ishiba administration will have to go into the parliamentary session leading a minority government, he is hoping diplomacy will give his administration a boost.
U.S. Vice President-elect JD Vance following a meeting with Republican Senators in Washington on Jan. 8
WORLD / Politics
Jan 13, 2025

JD Vance predicts hostage deal before Trump’s return to White House

JD Vance says a hostage deal with Hamas is likely before Trump’s inauguration, crediting tough rhetoric for pushing negotiations forward.
A former cattle ranch is being reforested in Brazil's Amazon region on Dec. 11. Mombak, a young carbon credit company — with valuable contracts with the giants Google and Microsoft, and supported by the U.S. government — aims to repeat this move millions of times over.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Jan 13, 2025

In Brazil, an Amazon reforestation project seeks to redeem carbon markets

By planting native species, Brazilian company Mombak hopes to restore credibility to a scandal-ridden carbon market at a crucial time for the warming planet.
Pete Hegseth, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Pentagon, during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee at the Capitol in Washington on Tuesday
WORLD / Politics
Jan 15, 2025

Trump nominee Pete Hegseth weathers Democrat grilling largely unscathed

Hegseth, a former Fox News host and decorated veteran, is one of the most controversial figures ever nominated to be secretary of defense.
Elon Musk, left, with Vivek Ramaswamy on Capitol Hill in Washington on Dec. 5.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 15, 2025

SEC accuses Elon Musk of bilking Twitter investors out of millions

The agency’s complaint accuses Musk of failing to promptly report that he had amassed more than 5% of the social media platform’s stock in early 2022.
Because of the U.S. dollar peg, Hong Kong can no longer be Asia’s go-to fundraising platform, eroding a key selling point for the financial center.
COMMENTARY
Jan 15, 2025

Hong Kong-dollar peg makes less sense than ever

It’s increasingly clear that the currency regime, which inevitably ties the city’s lending rates to those of the U.S., is outdated and needs a revamp.
People wave Palestinian flags while celebrating the announcement of a ceasefire in Ramallah in the West Bank on Wednesday.
WORLD
Jan 16, 2025

Israel and Hamas reach ceasefire deal to end 15 months of war in Gaza

Israel and Hamas have reached a ceasefire agreement that includes a phased withdrawal of Israeli forces, the release of hostages and humanitarian aid to Gaza.
U.S. President Joe Biden delivers his farewell address to the nation from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Wednesday.
WORLD / Politics
Jan 16, 2025

Biden warns U.S. faces oligarchy as Trump looms over legacy

In a final Oval Office speech, Biden urged Americans to join together but quickly warned about a dangerous concentration of wealth in the U.S.
Hino Motors was charged with fraud in the U.S. District Court in Detroit for unlawfully selling 105,000 heavy-duty diesel engines in the United States from 2010 through 2022 that did not meet emissions standards.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 16, 2025

Hino Motors reaches $1.6 billion U.S. diesel emissions settlement

Hino said it booked an extraordinary loss of ¥230 billion in its second quarter results in October to cover the expected costs of resolving the litigation.
The TikTok ban results from an April law signed by President Joe Biden and is the first time the United States has attempted to shut down access to an app with such a large user base — roughly 170 million domestic users.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 17, 2025

How a TikTok ban would work — and why user workarounds won't

TikTok reportedly plans to shut down the service and will show users a message about the law and offer to let them download their personal data.
The prospect of a TikTok ban has already triggered some users to seek alternatives, with Chinese social media app RedNote gaining nearly 3 million U.S. users in one day earlier this week.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 17, 2025

TikTok's fight against going dark gains support from key U.S. lawmakers

A law passed in April mandates owner ByteDance to divest TikTok's U.S. assets by Sunday to a non-Chinese buyer, or be banned on national security concerns.
Many of the economists noted the interest rate hike is likely unless Donald Trump jolts global financial markets, after he returns to the White House four days before the Bank of Japan’s policy decision.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 17, 2025

More than 70% of BOJ watchers expect a rate hike next week

BOJ Gov. Kazuo Ueda reinforced his deputy’s message this week that his board will consider a rate hike at the meeting, boosting the yen and expectations for action.

Longform

Wealthier women in the prewar era had been the targets of various media-related health campaigns that mistakenly encouraged them to avoid everything from riding bicycles to reading novels when their monthly cycles came around.
Menstruation in Japan: Breaking the silence, slowly