Deliberations on the bill, which is predicted to bring in 340,000 blue-collar foreign workers, only started Nov. 21, leading opposition parties to call for more discussion.

Line, Japan’s messaging app giant with 78 million users, is stepping up its bid to become a major cashless payment platform by targeting Chinese tourists.

The SESC was aware of the alleged misconduct, sources say, and notified the bank involved in the transaction that Ghosn may have committed an aggravated breach of trust.

If Japan ever calls a referendum on whether to revise the postwar Constitution, it could spark a heated TV advertising war, akin to what the U.S. goes through for its presidential election campaigns. The national referendum law as it now stands in principle enables anyone ...

Countries must hit China with sanctions over the mass detention of ethnic Uighurs in its western Xinjiang region, hundreds of scholars said on Monday, warning that a failure to act would signal acceptance of "psychological torture of innocent civilians." Beijing has in recent months faced ...

The government is considering transforming a helicopter destroyer into an aircraft carrier, a source said, in what could be seen as a departure from the country’s pacifist Constitution.

The transport ministry on Tuesday conducted an on-site inspection of Japan Airlines Co. after one of its pilots was arrested in Britain for heavy drinking before a flight from London to Tokyo late last month. Through the inspection at the company's Tokyo headquarters and other ...

The northeastern prefecture of Akita came in second, behind Tokyo, in a ranking of Japanese prefecture names searched on the internet abroad, a survey by a digital advertising company has found. The result was unexpected, with Akita coming ahead of such prefectures as Kyoto and ...

Donald Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort violated his plea agreement by lying to investigators, prosecutors said Monday, as another former aide began serving a jail sentence for making false statements to the FBI. Manafort had agreed to cooperate with special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation ...

Long before the downfall of his mentor Carlos Ghosn, Nissan Motor Co. Chief Executive Officer Hiroto Saikawa had pushed to win more power for the Japanese carmaker in its strained alliance with Renault SA. Now he has a chance to do just that. Saikawa, 65, ...

Will Japanese firms remain in post-Brexit Britain or find more welcoming friends?

Japan's stakes in a low carbon world economy is among the highest as it is on the front line of climate disasters and also a leading contributor to greenhouse gas emissions.

Tokyo has once again been hailed as the culinary capital of the world, holding on to its coveted spot as the city with the most Michelin-starred restaurants on the planet, the French company revealed Tuesday. The capital, which in the 2019 Tokyo Michelin Guide boasts ...

Composer and performer Ned Rothenberg has spent his career traversing different musical worlds. He has worked extensively as both a composer and performer in the jazz and improvisation scenes, playing alto saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet and the shakuhachi, a Japanese bamboo flute. Rothenberg, 62, has ...

Screening in competition at this year's Venice Film Festival, "Killing" is veteran provocateur Shinya Tsukamoto's first venture into the samurai genre. Made, like most of Tsukamoto's films, on a tiny budget and tight schedule, it does not attempt the scale of classics like "Seven ...

From the get-go, "Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald" makes it clear that the new installment of J.K. Rowling's "Fantastic Beasts" franchise will be gloomier and heavier than the first film, a playful romp set in New York during the age of jazz. Katherine Waterston, ...

Italian film director Bernardo Bertolucci, whose films include "Last Tango In Paris" and "1900," died on Monday aged 77. Considered one of the giants of world cinema, Bertolucci was the only Italian ever to win the Oscar for best film, snapping up the award in ...

New Sunwolves coach Tony Brown named an initial 29-man squad Tuesday for the 2019 Super Rugby season, calling it "good enough to push for a place in the playoffs." The former All Black, who is the side's fourth head coach in as many years, has ...

Yoshihiro Maru and Hotaka Yamakawa spent the year putting up career numbers to help propel their clubs to league championships. For their last order of business in the 2018 season, they picked up some hardware for themselves. Maru, the Hiroshima Carp's star outfielder, was named Central ...

International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach said Tuesday that there is no "Plan B" if 2026 Winter Games bids from Stockholm and two Italian cities are withdrawn, reiterating that Sapporo is not a fallback option. Speaking exclusively to Kyodo News in Tokyo, Bach acknowledged that ...

With the Rugby World Cup set for next year, head coach Jamie Joseph believes there is still a lot of room for the Japan national team to improve. To reach that target, he insisted that the Brave Blossoms need to keep playing Tier 1 ...

Top NBA prospect Rui Hachimura played a pivotal role in Gonzaga University's dramatic 89-87 victory over top-ranked Duke University last Wednesday at the Maui Invitational in Lahaina, Hawaii. Not only did Hachimura, a junior forward, block two shots in the final minute of the game, ...

Two American football players belonging to the X League's Panasonic Impulse were arrested Monday on suspicion of importing and possessing marijuana, Osaka police said. Benjamin Anderson, a 26-year-old quarterback, is suspected of importing about 26 grams of marijuana via international mail from the United States ...

Rika Kihira staked her claim as Japan's biggest female skating star with a victory at the Internationaux de France in Grenoble on Saturday night. The triumph clinched a spot in next month's Grand Prix Final for the 16-year-old. Two weeks after winning the NHK Trophy ...