China's president, Hu Jintao, arrives in Tokyo, presenting a friendly face and an end to rancor between his country and Japan. But the case of the bad dumplings may poison high expectations for the talks, Donna Kwok, Stratfor's East Asia analyst, tells Colin Chapman. [more]
Rumors are flying in Tokyo that Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda is about to step down because of problems rooted in Japan's deeply entrenched and inefficient economic-political system. [more]
South Korea's upcoming military cooperation deal with Japan and its formal protest to China over the treatment of some South Koreans during the Olympic torch relay both offer insight into South Korea's geopolitical imperatives. [more]
The announcement that Japan discovered spinal column fragments in beef shipped from the United States threatens to derail U.S. beef shipments to Japan and Washington's planned free trade agreement with South Korea. [more]
Japan has deployed the fourth Patriot Advanced Capability-3 battery outside of Tokyo, completing initial plans for rudimentary ballistic missile defense coverage of the Japanese capital. (With Stratfor map)[more]
Looking at the global military landscape, South Korea sees three interlocking defense priorities for itself: keeping North Korea at bay, projecting power regionally and refining its emergency expeditionary capability. (With Stratfor map)[more]
Although ricin can be a quite effective weapon in targeted assassinations and suicides, militants are much more apt to choose the weapons they know -- firearms and bombs. [more]
Tokyo is considering sending Japanese peacekeeping troops to Sudan, Japan's Foreign Minister said in an interview with the Financial Times published Feb. 25. [more]
Fighter aircraft from the Japan Air Self Defense Force and the U.S. Navy intercepted a Russian strategic bomber that entered Japanese airspace Feb. 9. [more]
A Japanese newspaper report raises questions about whether Tokyo and Beijing could be nearing a settlement over the contentious issue of maritime boundaries and natural gas deposits in the East China Sea. [more]
A Japanese Trade Ministry official has denied a report that China and Japan have settled their dispute over natural gas fields by agreeing to split the profits from joint development projects East China Sea equally. [more]
Japan's lower house of parliament passed a controversial bill Jan. 11 allowing its armed forces to resume refueling operations in the Indian Ocean in support of U.S. and coalition anti-terrorism operations in Afghanistan. [more]
Japan and China have been involved in a race to secure present and future uranium supplies, as they see nuclear power eventually playing a significant part in their energy mix. [more]
The year 2008 is critical for Beijing; it is the year in which China will finally be showcased as a modern and "big" nation. This is one section of the Annual Forecast 2008. [more]
One day before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda is scheduled to arrive in Beijing, China issued a white paper on energy policies that strongly emphasizes foreign participation in domestic oil exploration and development activities. [more]
Japanese Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba's statements on Thursday about defense deployments in response to an attack by Godzilla or Mothra hint at an important underlying issue: the evolution of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces. [more]
