{"id":75142,"date":"2025-11-12T13:13:21","date_gmt":"2025-11-12T04:13:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/nov\/12\/japan-pm-sumo-wrestling-ban-women"},"modified":"2025-11-12T13:13:21","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T04:13:21","slug":"japans-new-pm-faces-sumo-sized-dilemma-will-takaichi-defy-the-sports-ban-on-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=75142","title":{"rendered":"Japan\u2019s new PM faces sumo-sized dilemma: will Takaichi defy the sport\u2019s ban on women?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Women are banned from entering the \u2018sacred\u2019 dohyo. Sanae Takaichi is undecided on whether to attend a trophy presentation later this month<\/p>\n<p>Anticipation is building among <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/sport\/sumo-wrestling\">sumo<\/a> fans in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/japan\">Japan<\/a> as they wait to discover if the country\u2019s first female prime minister, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/oct\/04\/sanae-takaichi-the-new-leader-of-japans-liberal-democratic-party-who-cites-thatcher-as-an-influence\">Sanae Takaichi<\/a>, will defy centuries of tradition and step into the sumo ring to present a trophy later this month.<\/p>\n<p>With 11 days of the current 15-day tournament in Fukuoka, south-west Japan, remaining, government officials have left the sport\u2019s devotees guessing with vague comments over the likelihood of clash between Takaichi and the Japan sumo association.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/nov\/12\/japan-pm-sumo-wrestling-ban-women\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Women are banned from entering the \u2018sacred\u2019 dohyo. Sanae Takaichi is undecided on whether to attend a trophy presentation later this monthAnticipation is building among sumo fans in Japan as they wait to discover if the country\u2019s first female prime min&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4825,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,88,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-japan","category-world-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4825"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75142"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75142\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75143,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75142\/revisions\/75143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}