Japanese leader revives dark memories of imperial-era biological experiments in China

For several years during World War II, a branch of the Japanese Imperial Army known as Unit 731 operated a vast biological and chemical research program in the Chinese province of Manchuria. The Japanese researchers conducted blood-curdling experiments on Chinese prisoners, many of them civilians, injecting them with chemicals, mutilating them, removing organs and committing other unspeakable ac

Photos of Ai Weiwei's latest work, a response to China's baby milk scandal

Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has unveiled his newest piece in Hong Kong a work composed of 1,800 large tins of milk powder, arranged into a map of China. Each province is marked off by a different brand of milk. Read full article >>

English-language proposal has French up in arms

PARIS — There was a time, not so long ago, when anyone with a proper education spoke French. Diplomacy and business were conducted in French. Knowledge was spread in French. Travelers made their way in French, and, of course, lovers traded sweet nothings in French. Read full article >>

N. Korea fires 3 short-range guided missiles into its eastern waters, South reports

TOKYO — North Korea on Saturday launched three short-range guided missiles off its eastern coast, South Korea’s National Defense Ministry said, a test of the tentative calm that has emerged on the peninsula after a period of heightened tensions last month. Read full article >>

World Digest: May 17, 2013

Two bombs hidden in a motorcycle and a car exploded Friday evening inside an elite gated community linked to the family of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, killing at least nine people and wounding more than 70 near the southern city of Kandahar, an official said. Read full article >>

At trade talks, U.S., E.U. ready for fight on genetically modified crops

LENNEWITZ, Germany — Many Europeans see American farming and its reliance on genetically modified crops as more Frankenstein than Farmer in the Dell.Now, the opposition here to U.S. agricultural practices is threatening to become a major battle in discussions starting next month that could sweep away trade barriers between the United States and Europe. Read full article >>

Bombs targeting Sunnis kill at least 76 in Iraq

BAGHDAD — Bombs struck Sunni districts in Baghdad and surrounding areas Friday, killing at least 76 people in the deadliest day in Iraq in more than eight months, officials said, as a spike in violence has created fears that the country could be on the path to a new round of sectarian bloodshed. Read full article >>

U.N. chief, in Russia, talks up Syria peace conference

MOSCOW — As Russian warships from the Pacific, Black Sea, Northern and Baltic fleets steamed toward a rendezvous in the eastern Mediterranean, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday to underscore his support for a peace conference on Syria proposed by Moscow and Washington earlier this month. Read full article >>

Thieves make off with $1 million in jewels from hotel near Cannes Film Festival

Thieves stole around $1 million worth of jewelry from a hotel near the Cannes Film Festival sometime early Friday morning, the Associated Press reports. The jewels were in a safe that the thieves ripped out of a wall of a hotel room. Read full article >>

Get caught up on Benghazi, in five short paragraphs

Eight months after militants stormed a U.S. diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, Libya, killing Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, the political controversy is still raging. Congressional Republicans are still holding investigative hearings, and Gallup found that 69 percent of Americans agree (including 52 who strongly agree) that "the issues being raised in the Benghazi hearings inv

5 insights on the racial tolerance and ethnicity maps, from an ethnic conflict professor

This week, we've examined global comparative data on ethnic diversity (here's our map of the most and least diverse countries) and, more controversially, on racial tolerance (here's our map of countries where people show the highest and lowest levels of racial tolerance). I say "controversially" because of the subject's sensitivity and because reducing such a complicated, subjective phenomenon t

Chinese tourists' bad manners harming country's reputation, says senior official

Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang has criticized the "uncivilized behavior" of his countrymen when they travel abroad, which he says has harmed the nation's image. He blamed the "poor quality and breeding" of the Chinese tourists. Read full article >>

Nothing entertaining in anti-Japan films, Chinese censor says

BEIJING — China’s film censors are offering hope for improved relations with Japan — or at least, that appears to be the case at first glance. As a bitter standoff over a disputed group of islands in the East China Sea fuels long-running animosity between the two neighbors, Beijing’s television regulator is cracking down on TV dramas that feature scenes such as a Chinese kung fu hero ripping

Jorge Rafael Videla, ruthless Argentine junta leader, dies at 87

Jorge Rafael Videla, the remorseless Argentine army commander who came to power in a coup that launched the most barbaric period of the country’s modern history, including thousands of extrajudicial killings and kidnappings, died May 17 at a prison near Buenos Aires. He was 87. Read full article >>

Disturbing video: Greek member of parliament shouts 'heil Hitler' during session

At first it's tough to make out through the shouting, but, about 36 seconds into the above video from a session of parliament in Greece, the words come through loud and clear: "Heil Hitler."A Greek member of Parliament, from the far-right party Golden Dawn, shouted the Nazi slogan after an argument on the parliament floor, according to the International Business Times and a local outlet calle

Maligned dollar flourishes in Venezuela

CARACAS, Venezuela — The once-almighty U.S. dollar has lost its luster in some corners of the world.But there’s one outpost where greenbacks have never been stronger: in socialist, anti-imperialist Venezuela, whose government rails against American-style capitalism as the bane of humanity. The dollar is not just holding steady here — it is flourishing like nowhere else, the byproduct of the f

White House visit by Burma’s Thein Sein a sign of changing times

RANGOON, BURMA — T-shirts bearing images of President Obama and Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese pro-democracy leader, hang side by side in the shops just off the busy Kabar Aye Pagoda Road in Rangoon. It’s a reminder of the history made last November when Obama became the first sitting U.S. president to set foot in Burma. Read full article >>

North Korea condemns media freedom but praises two U.S. reporters

How does North Korea celebrate World Press Freedom Day? First of all, two weeks late, on May 15 rather than May 3, presumably (and tellingly) because that's how long it took to get around to it. But get around to it North Korea did, with a special editorial in the state-run Rodong Sinmun, the country's preeminent newspaper. Entitled "Mockery of Press," it targets the U.S. media, arguing that the

World Digest: May 16, 2013

Suspected militants in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula abducted seven security personnel as they headed to Cairo for holidays early Thursday, security officials said. It was the first such kidnapping of security forces in the volatile region. Read full article >>

Sectarianism in Iraq stoked by Syrian war

BAGHDAD — A recent tide of sectarian tensions that erupted into the worst violence seen in Iraq in five years is testing the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose ability to contain the crisis could hinge on a conflict raging beyond his control in Syria. Read full article >>

U.S. may strip Bangladesh of tariff breaks

The Obama administration may strip Bangladesh of import breaks following deadly accidents in the country’s textile industry, another sign of the pressure building on the Southeast Asian nation to improve labor conditions. Read full article >>

Syrian rebels demand weapons before talks

BEIRUT —The Syrian opposition is demanding access to arms before planned peace talks next month, amid a growing consensus that it may take a shift in the balance of power on the battlefield before any meaningful negotiations can take place. Read full article >>

Taliban rival claims Kabul blast that leaves at least 15 dead, including two U.S. troops

KABUL — An Islamist militant group once allied with the United States and considered more moderate than the Taliban appeared to be behind a rush-hour suicide bombing in the Afghan capital Thursday morning that killed at least 15 people — two American troops, four civilian NATO contractors and nine Afghan civilians, including children walking to school. Read full article >>

Report: Income inequality rising in most developed countries

LONDON — The divide between rich and poor is widening in developed nations, according to a new report released Wednesday by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.According to the new data, economic disparity has risen more from 2007 to 2010 than in the preceding 12 years. Over this period, the OECD has documented increasing income inequality caused by the finan

A revealing map of the world's most and least ethnically diverse countries

_ Update: A professor who studies race and ethnic conflict responds to this map._ Ethnicity, like race, is a social construct, but it's still a construct with significant implications for the world. How people perceive ethnicity, both their own and that of others, can be tough to measure, particularly given that it's so subjective. So how do you study it? Read full article >>

Uruguay’s Mujica talks up Brazil ties

MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay — It is clear where Jose Mujica’s priorities lie. And they are not across the River Plate.After a spot of morning work on his tractor, the maverick Uruguayan president dismisses Argentina as “very, very, very closed in on itself, very 1960s-ish.” The former leftist guerrilla then lauds his northern neighbor, Brazil, for “knowing what it wants and going for it.” Read full

27-year-old CIA wig resurfaces in Moscow spy case

MOSCOW All that low-tech equipment that Russian security officers displayed for the TV cameras after detaining Ryan Fogle, American diplomat and alleged spy, made it look as though he stepped right out of the annals of 1980s Cold War espionage. Read full article >>

A dazzling documentary about pop music in China's Muslim-majority province

Life can get complicated in Xinjiang, the far-western Chinese province perhaps best known as the home of ethnic Uighurs, who are majority Muslim. As in neighboring Tibet, Beijing restricts traditional religious practice there and keeps the province largely shut off from the outside world. Stories of sometimes violent unrest trickle out as a steady influx of ethnic Hans (China's majority) transfo

François Hollande, France’s Socialist leader, is steering a middle-line path

ST. NAZAIRE, France — This Atlantic port is the heart of France’s shipbuilding tradition, where the British came to have the Queen Mary 2 built a decade ago and where Royal Caribbean recently ordered a $1.5 billion floating palace for island-hopping by the masses. Read full article >>

Map: How the world voted on a U.N. resolution for political transition in Syria

The United Nations General Assembly voted on a resolution Tuesday to condemn Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime for its "indiscriminate" shelling and bombing of civilians. The resolution, which passed, also urges a political transition through "inclusive" democratic elections. Read full article >>