Tag: Japan

China Reels From Floods and a Bruising Heat Wave

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China and several other Asia Pacific countries were reeling from monsoonal floods and stultifying temperatures on Wednesday, the latest disruptions in what forecasters say could be a long summer and autumn of extreme weather around the world. The authorities in China said on Wednesday that 15 people had died and four others were missing as a result of flooding in the sprawling southwestern city of Chongqing, according to the state-run news media. In another sign of how bad the flooding was in China, news footage showed rescuers in the central…

Atomic Agency Clears Japan to Release Fukushima Water

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In one of the remaining steps before Japan decides to release more than one million metric tons of treated radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean, the International Atomic Energy Agency declared on Tuesday that the government’s plan had met the agency’s safety standards. The nuclear authority’s final report concluded that the treated water would “have a negligible radiological impact to people and the environment” once it is released. Japan’s plan has provoked controversy both at home and abroad, as government officials in China and many…

Fukushima: China calls for suspension of Japanese plan to release radioactive water into sea

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China has called for the suspension of a Japanese plan to begin releasing radioactive water from the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea, ahead of a UN report that is expected to give its approval to the scheme. Beijing denounced the plan as “extremely irresponsible” when it was announced in 2021 and reiterated its opposition on Tuesday, as International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief, Rafael Grossi, begins a four-day visit in which he is set to deliver the results of the body’s safety review. Through its embassy in Japan,…

For better or for worse: is the decline in marriage actually good for relationships? | Devorah Baum

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One of the curious things about marriage is the role it’s played in embedding commonly held views about normality. Married people are generally considered normal people. As such, they have possessed inordinate power to dictate the terms of normality in a way that single people rarely can. And yet marriage, clearly, isn’t for everyone. Plenty of people have no desire to do it. Plenty of others have done it and haven’t liked it. The stats only corroborate this. Fewer people over the years have been getting married, while the stresses…

China hits back at G7 nations, accusing them of ‘smears’ and ‘slander’

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Beijing has accused the G7 nations of collaborating to “smear and attack” China, after the weekend summit issued a communique that warned Beijing over its “militarisation activities” in the Asia-Pacific region. After the summit, China summoned the Japanese ambassador to register an official protest, and warned the UK to stop “slandering” the country to avoid further damage to bilateral relations. Chinese regulators also chose the weekend to announce that US chip firm, Micron Technology, had failed a security review and would be banned from use in Chinese critical infrastructure. The…

The U.S. Needs Minerals for Electric Cars. Everyone Else Wants Them Too.

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For decades, a group of the world’s biggest oil producers has held huge sway over the American economy and the popularity of U.S. presidents through its control of the global oil supply, with decisions by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries determining what U.S. consumers pay at the pump. As the world shifts to cleaner sources of energy, control over the materials needed to power that transition is still up for grabs. China currently dominates global processing of the critical minerals that are now in high demand to make…

Australia, India, Japan and US take thinly veiled swipe at China

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The leaders of the Quad group – Australia, India, Japan and the United States – delivered a thinly veiled swipe at Beijing’s behaviour on Saturday at a summit in Hiroshima. The US president, Joe Biden, and his three partners in the group did not mention China by name but the communist superpower was clearly the target of language in a joint statement calling for “peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific maritime domain”. “We strongly oppose destabilising or unilateral actions that seek to change the status quo by force or coercion,”…

Sunak to urge G7 support for collective action against ‘economic coercion’

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The UK and other G7 countries are planning collective action against Russia and China if they threaten trade boycotts for political reasons, announcing a new body to deal with “economic coercion”. Rishi Sunak will urge “bold and pragmatic collective action” against hostile states that stop trading with other countries when they disagree with their geopolitical decisions. He will cite Russia’s stranglehold on European gas supplies last year as a situation that could have been met with a collective response. Other examples include China’s punitive tariffs on Australian wine after Canberra…

UK’s £1bn strategy for semiconductor industry lacks ambition, say critics

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The UK government has announced an investment of up to £1bn in the domestic semiconductor industry, but has been criticised for declining to join the spending race that has seen the US and EU announce significantly bigger programmes. Labour accused the government of lacking ambition in its announcement, while one UK startup said the £1bn figure was less than the cost of one basic semiconductor plant. The UK’s long-awaited national semiconductor strategy would focus on the country’s existing strengths in the technology. Semiconductors, or microchips, are the “brains” of electronic…

Ukraine and China Will Dominate G7 Summit, but a New Threat Lurks: A.I.

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President Biden began his foreshortened Asia trip on Thursday in Hiroshima, a city that devotes itself to reminding the world of what happens when a brutal war escalates into a nuclear one. There he prepared for discussions with his closest allies on two crucial issues: how to better arm Ukraine as it enters its counteroffensive against the Russian invaders, and how to slow, or halt, the downward spiral in relations with China. Both are now familiar topics to the leaders of the Group of 7 nations, who have grown far…