Here are some initial thoughts on Japan’s disaster zone from TIME’s Hannah Beech and Krista Mahr:
This is a country that lives by timetables, that prides itself on predicting how to get people to places within the minute even under the most unusual circumstances. But no one could have predicted the unleashing of the worst-ever …
Perched on the Ring of Fire, an arc of seismic activity that encircles the Pacific Basin, Japan is one of the most earthquake-prone countries in the world — but it’s also one of the best equipped to handle them.
Having survived the ‘Great Kanto Earthquake’ of 1923, the utter the devastation of World War II and the 1995 …
What happens when the Dalai Lama steps down as political leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile? As far as India is concerned, he will always be welcome, according to statements today by the external affairs ministry.
“His holiness the Dalai Lama is an honoured guest in India. And he is a spiritual and religious leader,” an MEA
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When NATO forces accidently killed nine Afghan boys gathering firewood to heat their family homes last Wednesday, it marked a low point in a war that has already had its share of horrific mistakes. From wedding parties to religious school compounds, civilian casualties have been as much a part of the war as IEDs and donkey-borne …
Just how quickly can a politician be reincarnated? Hundreds of thousands of Tibetans—both within the troubled mountainous territory and in exile all around the world—must be pondering this metaphysical conundrum as their beloved spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, asked the Tibetan exile community today to allow him to retire from …
I visited Bihar for the first time in 1998, when its reputation for lawlessness was well-deserved. Traveling by train from Delhi, you knew exactly when you crossed the border into Bihar. That’s when groups of aggressive, ticket-less riders suddenly jumped onto the train, comfortable in the knowledge that, in Bihar, no one would …
He’s known as Michael Anti to Harvard and Hillary Clinton, among others. But in January, Facebook deleted the account of the Chinese media commentator because he didn’t use his legal name, Zhao Jing. Anti says Facebook’s decision cost him a profile with more than 1,000 friends and professional contacts. At first Anti says he …
China is a country where grand gestures play well. So when U.S. President Barack Obama appointed Republican pooh-bah Jon Huntsman Jr. as the American Ambassador to China back in 2009, Beijing was pleased to welcome such an august envoy to its shores. The excitement has since died down, particularly in recent days after Huntsman was …
The ripples of the Arab revolutions have reached the Caspian Sea. Inspired by youth-led uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, activists in the oil-rich, former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan used Facebook to announce Azerbaijan’s own “day of rage” on March 11. It’s unclear how many people will heed the call, but, as in other authoritarian …
To me, it sounded like a nightmare: six-stories of jewel-encrusted plastic, all tied up in pink. But for Mattel, the iconic American toymaker, the opening of Shanghai’s Barbie superstore in Mar. 2009 was a dream come true. Here, in 36,000-square-feet of doll-drenched retail space, Chinese women and girls would fall headlong for the …
India’s simmering telecom scandal has already dented the reputation of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Now, it may soon inflict some political damage to Singh’s Congress Party. At stake is the party’s alliance with a regional partner, the DMK, led for the last 40 years by the charismatic poet-politician M. Karunanidhi. With …
It’s budget time in Asia, and the men in uniform (along with their numerous plainclothes colleagues) must be thrilled. In China, where the rubber-stamp National People’s Congress (NPC) has gathered for its annual confab in Beijing, the military was gifted a 12.7% increase in spending, bringing its yearly coffers to $91.5 billion. …
Forgotten Genocide: In the New York Times, New Delhi correspondent Lydia Polgreen reports from Bangladesh about the country’s belated efforts to investigate the massacres that led up to its independence in 1971, when over a million people (up to three million, by some estimates) may have been killed by the Pakistani army and its Bengali …
