For the sixth time in two and a half years, Japan's central bank has raised its benchmark interest rate — now at 1.25 percent, a level unseen since 1995 — continuing its quiet departure from decades of near-zero borrowing costs. The decision reflects a world reshaped by energy disruptions, where central banks from Tokyo to Washington to Frankfurt are all tightening in unison, each responding to the same inflationary pressures flowing through global supply chains. Japan, long defined by deflation and monetary stillness, is now navigating a more turbulent economic current — one that has already