Tag - human-rights

 
 

HUMAN RIGHTS

The civil case centers on whether a foreign national in a same-sex partnership with a Japanese citizen should be granted “long-term resident status,” which allows residency for up to five years in Japan.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 2, 2023
Tokyo High Court rejects same-sex couple's residence status lawsuit
The civil case centers on whether a foreign national in a same-sex partnership with a Japanese citizen should be granted “long-term resident status.”
Plaintiffs filing damages lawsuits over forced sterilization under the now-defunct eugenic protection law head to the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 2, 2023
Grand Bench of top court to rule on forced sterilization damages
Five district courts have found the old law to be unconstitutional, but all rejected damages claims citing the statute of limitations.
Becoming the lone bidder for the 2034 World Cup, just 27 days after its campaign was announced, caps a stunning year where the unheralded Saudi Pro League has snapped up some of soccer's top stars including Cristiano Ronaldo (center).
SOCCER
Nov 1, 2023
Bridging the Gulf: How the World Cup is key to Saudi revamp
While human rights controversies have not gone away, the kingdom is gaining a reputation for extravagant forays into sport.
More and more children are producing content as online influencers and generating lots of money.
COMMENTARY
Oct 31, 2023
Kidfluencers are today’s version of chimney sweeps
Protecting children from labor exploitation is difficult in the age of social media.
Kwok Wai-shing (center) canvasses for votes to compete for a seat in the Sham Shui Po East constituency in Hong Kong's coming district council poll. Candidates from Hong Kong's main pro-democracy party were shut out of upcoming local elections after the nomination period ended on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Oct 31, 2023
Hong Kong election reforms exclude pro-democracy candidates
Directly elected seats in the district council were slashed from 452 to 88 after pro-democracy parties won a landslide victory in 2019.
Smoke rises from a leveled building as people gather amid the destruction in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on Gaza City on Thursday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 28, 2023
Israel rebuffs allies’ calls to ‘pause’ Gaza assault
The issue has opened the first public split between Israel and its backers, including the U.S., the EU, U.K. and other G7 members such as Japan.
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.
Tents for displaced Palestinians at a camp, operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, in western Khan Younis, Gaza, on, Oct. 17.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 26, 2023
Record 114 million people now displaced worldwide, says U.N.
Almost one-third of all displaced people originated from just three countries: Afghanistan, Syria and Ukraine.
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.
Lawyers Kazuyuki Minami (left) and Masafumi Yoshida (right) representing a transgender woman show off signs that say "unconstitutional" and "sent back" to a lower court, during a news conference Wednesday in Tokyo after a Supreme Court decision.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 25, 2023
Supreme Court hands down landmark decision on transgender rights
A law requiring sterilization surgery to change a person's legal gender has been declared “unconstitutional."
Women gather for a demonstration during a women’s strike in Reykjavik, Iceland, on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 25, 2023
Women strike to highlight inequality in most gender equal society
The protest focused attention on a gender pay gap, the uneven burden of unpaid work within the home and violence that still afflicts women.
Palestinians at the site of an Israeli strike on a house in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on Tuesday
WORLD / Politics
Oct 25, 2023
World leaders seek pause in Israeli strikes on Hamas for Gaza aid
Deadly clashes have intensified between multiple parties, with wider conflict posing a risk to security in a region key to global energy supplies.
A girl holds a sign in a show of support for Gazan children in the besieged enclave, during the Israeli-Hamas conflict, in Amman, Jordan, on Sunday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 24, 2023
Palestinians trapped in Gaza struggle to contact the outside world
With no 3G mobile service in the besieged and bombarded Gaza Strip, residents must either find a rare landline or hope for an Internet connection.
The site of the al-Ahli Arab Hospital after a blast ripped through the facility on Tuesday.
WORLD / Politics
Oct 22, 2023
In global conflict zones, hospitals and doctors are no longer spared
Over the last two decades, medical facilities and staff have become casualties of war more frequently, in violation of international law.
Kanata Kimoto had his womb and ovaries removed in Thailand when he was 24, so he could have his legal gender status changed. Now he questions whether such an invasive and costly procedure was necessary.
JAPAN / Society
Oct 22, 2023
Calls grow to abolish Japan's surgery requirement for gender change
Between 2004 and 2022, a total of 11,919 people had their gender changed through the law in Japan.
Smoke rises over buildings in the Gaza Strip on Saturday amid Israeli strikes.
WORLD
Oct 21, 2023
At Cairo summit, U.N. chief urges cease-fire to end Gaza 'nightmare'
Addressing a Cairo summit, Antonio Guterres said the Palestinian enclave of 2.4 million people was living through "a humanitarian catastrophe."
Australia had the chance to embrace reconciliation with its First Nations peoples in the Voice referendum. Voters chose division instead.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 17, 2023
Ignorance sank Australia’s Indigenous Voice referendum
Australia had the choice to embrace reconciliation with its First Nations peoples. Misinformation, dirty politics and apathy prevailed instead.
Palestinian refugees flee to Rafah, in southern Gaza, after Israeli airstrikes on Friday.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 17, 2023
Japan must uphold humanitarianism in the Middle East
War cries from Israel and Hamas must be met with appeals for the defense of human life, a position Japan has historically held.
Nobuo Okamura (right), an executive handling legal affairs for the Unification Church, speaks during a news conference on Monday at the organization's headquarters in Tokyo, as the church's lawyer Nobuya Fukumoto looks on.
JAPAN / Society
Oct 16, 2023
Unification Church calls government move a violation of rights
A news conference offered a glimpse of how the church will defend itself against a request to revoke its religious corporation status.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has told his Saudi Arabian counterpart that Israel's actions in Gaza have gone "beyond the scope of self-defense."
WORLD / Politics
Oct 15, 2023
China says Israel acting 'beyond scope of self-defense'
Foreign Minister Wang Yi's remarks came as Israel appeared poised for a ground offensive against Hamas militants in Gaza.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?