The director of Taiwan's National Palace Museum (NPM) said she hopes upcoming historical exhibits of NPM cultural treasures in Japan will showcase Taiwan's 'soft power'. Fung Ming-chu's remark came as over 200 sets of precious works from the NPM are set to be exhibited at the Tokyo National Museum from June and later this year at the Kyushu National Museum. It marks the first time NPM treasures will be displayed in an Asian country other than Taiwan.

Other countries are distorted by their failure to come to terms with brutal realities of their history. So are we.Listen to the next discussion you hear of tensions between Japan and two of its neighbors, South Korea and China. You'll hear again and again that an important root problem is Japan's difficulty in coming to terms with its history of wartime aggression in China and use of Korean "comfort women" as sex slaves for its troops.

According to The Japan Times, Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters on Monday that Japanese and North Korean diplomats will meet in Stockholm on May 26-28 to discuss a wide range of issues, including North Korea’s past abductions of Japanese citizens and its nuclear and ballistic missile program.The meeting is noteworthy, Clint rightly noted, mainly in that it is being held in Europe instead of Asia. The two sides usually hold their bilateral meetings in Asia, particularly China.

Christine Cumming of the New York Fed joins Andrés Rozental from the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations to discuss current economic trends and the role of the Fed in the financial regulatory system. Cumming expresses her concern that the financial system is failing in its mission to efficiently allocate capital to the most productive investment opportunities. She is optimistic about future growth prospects in the United States and explains why the current gradual approach to the tapering of monetary stimulus is appropriate.

A cherry tree by the Potomac River measures 2 meters around its trunk. Looking at the young leaves, you would never guess this tree was more than 100 years old. A nearby sign states that this is the first cherry tree that Tokyo gifted to Washington, D.C., in 1912 as a symbol of their friendship.

Last Saturday, May 3, was annual World Press Freedom Day. This year, the state of press freedom is especially grim; journalists face imprisonment, kidnapping, and death for doing their jobs. “Unfortunately, we really don’t have a lot to celebrate,” said Joel Simon, executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

From April 22 to April 29, U.S. President Barack Obama visited Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, and the Philippines in what many observers called an attempt to solidify his administration’s “rebalance to Asia.” The Diplomat spoke with Dr. Jonathan Pollack, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, about Obama’s goals for the trip, and the major events at each of his stops.

In November 2011, Barack Obama told the Australian parliament that the United States was embarking on a major shift in its foreign policy—with a pivot to Asia. “After a decade in which we fought two wars that cost us dearly, in blood and treasure,” he said, “the United States is turning our attention to the vast potential of the Asia Pacific region.”