Semua Kabar

New economic data shows stagnant consumption and falling exports are weighing heavily on Japan's economy. And US President Trump's tough trade polices are not expected to make things better.

Japan's economy contracted at a higher pace than expected in the first quarter of 2025, according to official data for the January to March period released on Friday.

Japan's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) contracted by 0.2% compared to the previous quarter, the first quarterly drop since the January-March period in 2024.

However, compared with the same quarter in the previous year, Japan's economy shrank by 0.7% — much steeper than the forecast 0.2% contraction

The decline was largely due to a fall in exports, which drive the Japanese economy. Data shows demand for exports was waning even before US PresidentDonald Trump announced sweeping tariffs.

On April 2, the US imposed a 24% tariff on Japanese goods. It also imposed an additional 25% levy on cars. The US is the largest market for Japan's auto industry.

After a reprieve, the tariffs are due to take effect in July, unless Japan can negotiate a deal.

"Uncertainty is greatly heightened by theTrump tariffs, and it is likely that the economic slowdown trend will become clearer from (the second quarter) onward," BNP Paribas chief economist Ryutaro Kono told AFP news agency.

Tokyo has been trying to negotiate a trade deal with the US, but policymakers have acknowledged its has been difficult to plan a response as Trump keeps changing his mind.

Japan's economy has been vulnerable for quite some time now, as anaging populationballoons welfare spending but limits labor and demand.

The Japanese central bank had long maintained a policy of negative interest rates to boost the economy but began to gradually hike rates last year.

Japan's economy "lacks a driver of growth given weakness in exports and consumption. It's very vulnerable to shocks such as one from Trump tariffs," said Yoshiki Shinke, senior executive economist at Dai-ichi Life Research Institute, told Reuters news agency.

"The data may lead to growing calls for bigger fiscal spending," he said, adding that "the possibility of the economy entering a recession cannot be ruled out, depending on the degree of downward pressure caused by the tariff issue."

The appointment of Jay Shah as chairman of the International Cricket Council has seen India wield more power in cricket globally. DW looks at the country's growing influence and the links between sport and government.

Through its financial strength, political connections and media,Indiahas long had a considerable influence over howcricketis played, broadcast and governed across the globe.

Concerns over what that means for other competing nations have increased following the unopposed election of the politically-connected Jay Shah as the chair of the International Cricket Council (ICC) last December. Shah still serves as secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

The BCCI is the richest cricket board in the world and runs theIndian Premier League (IPL), one of sport's richest and most successful competitions. Between 2024 and 2027, it is projected to earn $1.15 billion (€1 billion)—nearly 39% of the ICC's total annual revenue.

This comes largely from the huge sums broadcasters pay for television rights for a market of over 1.4 billion people, allowing India to shape everything from tournament schedules to ICC media rights.

The IPL is deeply entwined with Indian politics. It is overseen by the BCCI, with the competition's current chairman Arun Dhumal —brother of lawmaker Anurag Thakur of the rulingBharatiya Janata Party— underscoring the direct overlap between political power and cricket governance. Thakur, himself, a former BCCI president, was removed in 2017 by the Supreme Court over mismanagement concerns.

Political influence in the IPL extends beyond leadership. Pakistani players, who featured in the 2008 inaugural season, have been effectively barred ever since the Mumbai terror attacks later that year. In response, the Indian government revoked their visas, and the BCCI quietly excluded them from all future player auctions.

Even IPL scheduling reflects political realities. In 2009, the entire tournament was shifted to South Africa, and in 2014, 20 matches were moved to the United Arab Emirates, as the Indian government said it couldn't guarantee security during national elections. The IPL's alignment with state priorities illustrates how cricket in India often mirrors — and serves — political interests.

The election of Shah, who is the son of Indian Home Minister Amit Shah, as ICC chair,has fueled concerns about the BCCI's level of control over global cricket.

This dual role breaks with prior norms, where the ICC chair was expected to be independent from any national cricket board. Critics have argued that this undermines the ICC's role as a neutral global governing body.

When Shah's predecessor, Greg Barclay, was elected to the post in 2020, he resigned as chair of New Zealand Cricket. When he stepped down as ICC chair four years later, he implicitly criticized his successor for not following suit.

"We're really lucky to have India," Barclay said in an interview with UK newspaperThe Telegraphin December. "They're a massive contributor to the game across all the measures, but one country having that amount of power and influence does distort a whole lot of other outcomes, which is not necessarily helpful in terms of that global growth."

Shah has not commented on his possible conflicts of interest since his appointment in December. At the time, he said: "I am committed to working closely with the ICC team and all of our member nations to further globalize cricket."

Gautam Gambhir, former Indian opener and current head coach of the national team, has also played a prominent dual role in both cricket and politics. In 2019, he joined the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, saying: "I have been influenced by the prime minister (Narendra Modi), his vision for the country. This is a fabulous platform for me to do something for the country."

In March 2024, he announced his exit from active politics to return full-time to cricket, before taking on the head coach role for the national team.

Following a deadly attack inKashmirin 2025, Gambhir called for a complete freeze on bilateral cricket withPakistan. He argued that national security should take precedence over sporting diplomacy—though this was not a stance the BCCI or BJP themselves spoke of publicly.

India's influence in cricket is visible in its relationship with Pakistan. The two countries have not played a bilateral series since 2013, largely due to political tensions following military escalations and terror-related incidents.

Shah's influence after being appointed chair of cricket's global governing body was clearly shown at the start of 2025.

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While Pakistan had participated in the 2023 ICC World Cup held in India under heavy security restrictions, in November 2024 India's government refused permission for their cricket team to travel to Pakistan for the Champions Trophy the following year.

After a series of compromises and negotiations, the PCB agreed to a reciprocal deal where Pakistan's matches in ICC events hosted by India for the next five years would also be played at neutral venues, under Shah's watch. But Lahore was denied hosting the Champions Trophy final, after India qualified for the showpiece.

According to a May 2025 investigation by British dailyThe Guardian, Sanjog Gupta, head of sports at Jiostar—India's largest media conglomerate—is the leading candidate to become the next ICC CEO when Geoff Allardice vacates the role in July.

Jiostar holds a $3 billion broadcasting rights deal for ICC events. If Gupta assumes the role, both the ICC chair and CEO would be Indian nationals overseeing a structure where Indian broadcasters hold the largest financial stake.

India's rise as the superpower of world cricket is rooted in its financial weight, but it's now sustained by political influence and media control.

While this has brought modernization and commercialization to sport, it has also created a monopolistic structure that threatens the game's diversity and equity to the detriment of Pakistan and other, smaller cricketing nations.

Edited by: Chuck Penfold and Matt Pearson

A new genetic study has traced prehistoric human migration from Asia to North and South America. The findings are helping underrepresented Indigenous groups understand their ancestral origins.

The first people to inhabit the Americas migrated from modern-day Russia about20,000 to 30,000 years ago, a new study has found.

Published on May 15in the journalScience, the study suggests that the languages ​​and traditions of Indigenous groups living in the Americas today can be traced back to these early settlers. Traces of their cultures exist in the genes of modern Indigenous groups.

The study also found that the early settlers split into groups that became isolated in different environmental settings. The findings provide a newgeneticand cultural understanding of present-day South American communities, said the researchers.

"[It fills] key gaps in our understanding of how the diverse populations of present-day South America came to be," said Elena Gusareva, the study's lead author, who is based at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

Gusareva said the participants in the study had been "deeply motivated" to uncover their people's history, showing the importance of ancestral knowledge for people's identities.

The researcher cited an "urgent case" involving the Kawesqar people of Patagonia, whose population and 6,000-year-old cultural heritage is in danger of disappearing. "This genetic record is one of the last chances to preserve their legacy."

Gusareva and other researchers sequenced the genomes of 1,537 individuals from 139 ethnic groups in northern Eurasia and the Americas.

They compared the millions of tiny variations in the genes of modern-day Indigenous people to ancientDNAfrom the first peoples to arrive in the Americas, creatinga genomic dataset from people previously underrepresented in ancestral science.

Tracing how these genetic codes changed in people from different geographical regions and various Indigenous groups allowed them to study patterns of population history, migration and adaptation over thousands of years.

"Our genetic analysis of Indigenous groups is crucial because their genomes carry unique insights into the earliest human history in the region," said Gusareva's colleague, Hie Lim Kim, a geneticist at Nanyang Technological University.

Their analysis appears to corroborate existing archaeological evidence, showing the first peoples in the Americas diverged from North Eurasians between 19,300 and 26,800 years ago.

The dates are "consistent with a large body of archaeological evidence," said Francisco Javier Aceituno, an archaeologist at the University of Antioquia, Colombia, who was not involved in the new study.

By comparing genetic datasets, the researchers said they had been able to find the closest living relatives of Indigenous North Americans are west Beringian groups, such as the Inuit, Koryaks and Luoravetlans. Beringia was an ice bridge between modern-day Russia and North America duringthe last ice age.

Gusareva and Kim's study found that after the early settlers had arrived in South America and then split into four distinct groups — Amazonian, Andean, Chaco Amerindian and Patagonian — they each became isolated in different environments.

Aceituno told DW these groups of hunter-gatherers probably divided "to occupy new territories, generate new family groups and avoid isolation."

Gusareva believes the new genetic data shows natural barriers, such as theAmazon rainforestand the Andes mountain range, led to the isolation of these Indigenous groups.

"This made their genetic makeup more uniform, similar to what is seen in island populations," Gusareva said.

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The study also found Indigenous groups have distinct genetic traits, which may have evolved through their adapting to extreme environments and long-term isolation from other groups.

For instance, a group of Andean highlanders carries a gene mutation that helps themadapt to low levels of oxygen.

Mutations in the gene EPAS1 stimulate new blood vessel formation and produce more red blood cells. EPAS1 mutations have also been found in people from Tibet.

"As people adapted to diverse and often extreme environments — like high altitudes or cold climates — their genomes evolved accordingly," said Kim.

Previous studieshave found genetic variations among Brazil's Indigenous groups may cause them to respond differently to medication for blood clots or high cholesterol.

Kim said the new research had revealed more than 70 gene variations that could increase [people's] vulnerability to emerging infectious diseases. "Many of these populations are already small. It's critical to provide tailored health care and disease prevention efforts to support their well-being," said Kim.

From North Asia to South America: Tracing the longest human migration through genomic sequencing

Climate and environmental protest is rising in line with increasing global temperatures. But new draconian penalties are putting people who rally against climate pollution in jail.

In late 2024, in the industrial city of Newcastle on Australia's east coast, a flotilla of kayaks paddled into the harbor shipping lane to block a massive coal ship from docking.

The "climate defenders" gathered by activist group Rising Tide aimed to temporarily blockade the world's largest coal port and bring attention to aclimate crisiscaused primarily by burning fossil fuels. It also called for an end to new coal, oil and gas projects.

The New South Wales (NSW) state government and the police had attempted to stop the blockade in the courts. But after a judge lifted an order creating an exclusion zone at the port, the protesters held up the coal tanker for over 30 hours. Some 170 activists were arrested for alleged crimes, including the disruption of a major facility. Most could face fines of up to 22,000 Australian dollars (€12,350) or two years in jail, under a 2022 anti-protest bill.

The law criminalizes public assemblies that disrupt major public infrastructure such as roads, tunnels and ports, and was a response to past blockades byclimate protesters. The then-NSW attorney general said that prior laws did not sufficiently penalize the "major inconvenience that incidents like these cause to the community," along with "severe financial impacts" due to "lost productivity."

Zack Schofield, a spokesperson for Rising Tide who was also arrested, said the NSW law is being "used to target climate protesters almost exclusively."

A youngclimate activistwho blockaded a lane on Sydney Harbour Bridge in 2022 was the first to be charged under the NSW law and was initially given a 15-month sentence.

Sue Higginson, a member for the Greens Party in NSW, called the imprisonment of the nonviolent protester "undemocratic," adding that people should not be punished for "engaging in legitimate forms of dissent and civil disobedience."

One in five climate and environment protesters are arrested in Australia, which is the highest rate in the democratic world, according to a 2024 study onclimate protestcriminalization by researchers at the University of Bristol in the UK.

Harsh anti-protest laws have been passed across the country, the world's third-largest fossil fuel exporter. That includes the island state of Tasmania, where protests at sites of old growth forest logging can incur a $13,000 fine or a two-year prison sentence.

Similar punitive anti-protest laws have been enacted across Europe and US.

In the UK, recent amendments to the Public Order Act give police increased power to act on "serious disruption" from public protests.

FiveJust Stop Oilactivists were charged under the revised act for organizing the blockade of a UK motorway in 2022.

Charged with conspiracy to create a "public nuisance," the protesters were sentenced to prison terms of between four and five years in 2024 before their sentences were slightly reduced.

Said to be the longest sentences for a nonviolent protest in British legal history, they were almost on par with the five-year maximum sentence for aggravated assault, noted Global Witness, UK-based campaigners monitoring the criminalization and killing of environmental defenders.In May, four activists from Just Stop Oil were sentenced to between 18 and 30 months in prison for their part in an attempted action to disrupt plane traffic at northern England's Manchester airport last August.

The UK law has been used against climate and environmental protest 95% of the time, said Oscar Berglund, a senior lecturer in international public and social policy at the University of Bristol, who co-authored the 2024 report"Criminalisation and Repression of Climate and Environmental Protests."

In Germany, members of the nonviolent climate action groupLetzte Generation(Last Generation) were charged in May 2024 with "forming a criminal organization," said Berglund.

The law is typically used against mafia organizations, and has never been applied to a nonviolent activist group, said the researcher.

Meanwhile, anti-terror laws and military action have been used to suppress climate actions, including a blockade of a highway in The Hague, Netherlands, in 2023. This was in contravention of statute law, according to an Amnesty International study that described a "sweeping pattern of systematic attacks" that "undermine peaceful protest" across 21 European countries.

In addition to anti-protest laws passed by governments, climate activists are facing massive compensation claims from fossil fuel companies for disruptions caused during actions.

Known as strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPP), the anti-protest litigation peaked in March 2025 when a jury in the US state of North Dakota foundGreenpeace liablefor more than $660 million (€609 million) for its role in an oil pipeline blockade.

The action was bought by oil major,Energy Transfer,which has faced years-long resistance to an oil pipeline running through North Dakota — especially from the local Sioux Tribe, who set up a protest at the Standing Rock Reservation that gained international attention.

"It's part of a renewed push by corporations to weaponize our courts to silence dissent," said Sushma Raman, interim executive director of Greenpeace USA, of the compensation that could force the organization to shut down its US operations.

Beyond the threat of arrest and litigation, some 2,000 environmental defenders weremurderedbetween 2012 and 2023, with 401 cases reported in Brazil and 298 in the Philippines, according to the Bristol University report on the criminalization and suppression of climate and environmental protest.

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"You don't have to dig very deep," said Berglund of the influence of oil, gas and coal interests on harsher anti-protest laws and policing. "The protesters are being targeted because they are a threat to fossil fuel profits."

He added that in the UK, anti-protest laws were drafted in consultation with a right-wing think tank, Policy Exchange, which has openly promoted the oil and gas lobby.

But forLuke McNamara, a professor at the Faculty of Law and Justice at the University of New South Wales, these "punitive actions" also reflect "growing intolerance" for the disruption caused byclimate protestersresorting to peaceful civil disobedience.

"Australian politicians regularly share their great affection for the right to protest,"he said in reference to new local anti-protest laws. However, this principle "tends to crumble each time an innovative climate protest garners attention," he told DW.

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Back in Newcastle, some 130 Rising Tide protesters who pleaded not guilty remain uncertain about the severity of potential fines or imprisonment when their trial begins later this month.

"If the penalties are disproportionate, we will appeal," said spokesperson Zack Schofield of what could become a test case for judicial willingness to criminalize environmental dissent in Australia — and beyond.

For Berglund, such prosecutions confirm the increasing impact of the climate movement. "Protesters are targeted when they are successful," he said.

Edited by: Jennifer CollinsThis article was updated on 30.05 to include the information about four Just Stop Oil protesters being sentenced to prison for attempting to block air traffic at Manchester Airport.

Malcolm X was an icon of the Black civil rights movement and saw violence as a tool of resistance against oppression. He was born 100 years ago in Omaha, Nebraska.

"What do you think you would do after 400 years ofslaveryand Jim Crow and lynching? Do you think you would respond nonviolently?" Those were some of the key questionsMalcolm Xposed to American society.

Althoughslaveryhad been abolished in the US in 1865, the so-called Jim Crow laws continued to cement everyday discrimination against Black people until 1964. There were artificial barriers to their right to vote in some states, and in many they weren't allowed to sit next to white people on buses or in restaurants.

"Malcolm X addressed precisely the issues that were burning on the minds of oppressed African Americans," Britta Waldschmidt-Nelson, author of the biography "Malcolm X: The Black Revolutionary," told DW.

His message to African Americans was clear: Be self-confident! Fight for your rights "by any means necessary" — even with violence.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Les Payne (1941-2018) recalled in his Malcolm X biography how a 1963 speech by the activist freed him, as if by a "flashing sword blow," from the "conditioned feeling of inferiority as a Black man" deeply rooted in his psyche.

That was precisely Malcolm X's goal.

Born on May 19, 1925, in Omaha, Nebraska, Malcolm Little's childhood near Detroit was marked by poverty and violence. He was six years old when his father was found dead; according to various accounts, he had been murdered by white supremacists. With seven children and little money, Malcolm's mother was completely overwhelmed and became mentally ill. Malcolm was placed in various foster families and institutions; he later spoke in his autobiography of the "terror of the very white social workers."

Despite his difficult beginnings, he was a good student, the only Black person in his class. A key experience had a profound impact on him: His favorite teacher asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up. Malcolm replied that he would like to study law. But the teacher, using an offensive racist slur to describe him, told him that wasn't a realistic goal for a boy like him.

The young Malcolm was completely disillusioned. His grades dropped dramatically, and at 15, he moved to Boston to live with his half-sister Ella Collins, and later to New York. He supported himself by doing odd jobs before becoming a petty criminal. In his early 20s, he was imprisoned for various burglaries.

"Here is a Black man caged behind bars, probably for years, put there by the white man," he later wrote in his autobiography. "You let this caged-up Black man start realizing, as I did, how from the first landing of this first slave ship, the millions of Black men in America have been like sheep in a den of wolves. That's why Black prisoners become Muslims so fast when Elijah Muhammad's teachings filter into their cages by the way of other Muslim convicts."

The mentor Malcolm X refers to, Elijah Muhammad, was a Black separatist and the leader of the Nation of Islam, a religious-political organization of African Americans outside of Islamic orthodoxy.

Nation of Islam (NOI) "claims that all Black people are inherently children of God and good, and all white people are inherently evil and children of the devil," explains Waldschmidt-Nelson. "What made this very attractive to Malcolm and many other prison inmates, of course, is that someone would come along and say, 'You are not to blame for your misery; it is the blue-eyed devils who made you go astray.'"

After joining NOI, he started calling himself Malcolm X, because African Americans' surnames had historically been assigned by their slave owners. Therefore, NOI members rejected their slave names and called themselves simply "X."

He spent his seven years in prison educating himself and remained a member of NOI for 14 years. Leader Elijah Muhammed appreciated the young man's intellectual acumen and oratory skills and made him the organization's spokesperson.

In his speeches, Malcolm X repeatedly denounced the "white devils." Although he lived in the northern states of the US — the "Promised Land" for Black people from the even more restrictive southern states — he no longer placed any hope in white "liberals" there either. After all, he had personally experienced how Black people were treated as second-class citizens throughout the US.

Malcolm X was long scornful ofMartin Luther King Jr.'scivil rights movement. He criticized King's famous speech at the 1963 March on Washington about a free and united America, united across all racial barriers, as unrealistic: "No, I'm not an American. I'm one of 22 million Black people who are the victims of Americanism. […] And I see America through the eyes of the victim. I don't see any American dream; I see an American nightmare."

After becoming disillusioned with the organization's leader, Malcolm X broke ranks with the Nation of Islam in March 1964.

That same year, he made a pilgrimage toMecca— and his image of the "white devils" began to waver. "He was deeply impressed by the hospitality and warmth with which he was greeted, even by white Muslims in Saudi Arabia," writes Britta Waldschmidt-Nelson in her biography. "And then, in the last year of his life, he turned away from this racist doctrine," she told DW.

He set himself a new task: "Malcolm X wanted to create an alliance of all oppressed people of color against white colonial oppression," says the biographer.

On a trip to Africa, governments praised his intention, but he couldn't count on their support: "Of course, they were all dependent on US development aid, and most African governments wouldn't have operated openly against the US at the time."

Instead, Malcolm X became the focus of the CIA. The Nation of Islam was also on his heels. "He knew he was going to be assassinated, and it was also a conscious decision on his part to face it," says Waldschmidt-Nelson. "He probably said to himself: I can't give up now. After his experience in Mecca, Malcolm had embarked on a completely new path, open to collaborating with King's civil rights movement and, if necessary, with white people as well."

But that never happened. On February 21, 1965, he wasshot deadduring a lecture by members of the Nation of Islam. He was only 39 years old.

In the 1980s,hip-hopartists celebrated Malcolm X's legacy by sampling his speeches in their music: "All that became very resonant," says Michael E. Sawyer, professor of African American literature and culture at the University of Pittsburgh. "It was a way to create this kind of resurgence of Black identity as also a political identity." The songs served as political declarations of war on white racism, police brutality and the impoverishment of the Black underclass.

In 1992,Spike Leeadapted Malcolm X's autobiography into a film starring Denzel Washington, which also contributed to turning the revolutionary figure into an icon forging many Black people's cultural identity.

Today, as the current US administration is whitewashing history to understate the role racism played in shaping the country, and with the MAGA movement opposed to any criticism of America's alleged past glory, Malcolm X's words remain more relevant than ever:

"You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it."

This article was originally written in German.