North Korea reportedly informs Japan that Minoru Tanaka of Hyogo, who vanished in 1978 in a suspected North Korean kidnapping, is living in Pyongyang with his former coworker.

Prime Minister Abe’s dream of revising the Constitution gets harder after he claims 60 percent of Japan’s local governments are resisting Tokyo’s efforts to recruit new SDF members.

The Cabinet approves a bill to recognize Japan’s ethnic Ainu minority as an indigenous people for the first time, after decades of discrimination and assimilation.

Otsuka Kagu Ltd. said Friday the struggling furniture retailer has reached a basic agreement to form a business tie-up with major electronics retailer Yamada Denki Co. The two companies will provide each other with know-how on selling furniture and home appliances while cooperating on human ...

A Japanese cultivator of bonsai trees has appealed for the thieves who made off with his expensive potted plants to take good care of them. Seiji Iimura, a fifth-generation bonsai cultivator who runs the Kirakuen garden store in Kawaguchi, Saitama Prefecture, said Tuesday the seven ...

While there has been tangible progress toward achieving full barrier-free access for people with physical disabilities through the installation of ramps, elevators and other pieces of infrastructure at public facilities, measures to clear obstacles for people with mental disabilities have been sorely lacking in ...

Noriko Mori, 47, paid about ¥700,000 ($6,300) to a cram school to help her daughter prepare for a school entrance exam in Tokyo. Her daughter was six, and the entrance exam was for an elementary school. "It was expensive," Mori said. But "she passed the ...

Despite the low odds of success for the second Trump-Kim summit, there is no alternative to diplomacy in the search for peace on the Korean Peninsula.

Beijing and Moscow are teaming up to diminish Washington's global influence, spread tyranny and undermine democracy.

It was only after the third run to the bathroom that regret started to set in over my beachside lunch — a veritable smorgasbord that included a green curry chock-full of seafood, tom yum hot-and-sour soup and a smattering of side dishes, all enjoyed ...

A bakery in a tiny, rural town in northeast Tasmania has become an unlikely pilgrimage site for Japanese tourists and Studio Ghibli animation fans alike. No one is quite sure how or when the Ross Village Bakery became a cult tourist destination, but it's believed ...

From going without a host to handing out key awards during commercial breaks to a quickly nixed idea for a popular film category — Oscar organizers are struggling to keep Hollywood's biggest night relevant while dealing with messy controversies. With less than two weeks to ...

The lawyer representing a porn star in a legal battle with U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday his office has previously unreleased footage of R&B superstar R. Kelly having sex with a young girl. Michael Avenatti said his team discovered the graphic tape as representatives ...

A moving Chinese epic looking at the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution, the one-child policy and forced abortion made it past censors to premiere at the Berlin film festival Thursday despite a widening crackdown. "Di jiu tian chang" ("So Long, My Son") by Wang Xiaoshuai, ...

Like countless sports fans, Mitsuaki Ono can pinpoint a formative period in his life that cemented his fandom. The Kawasaki native was living in Rochester, Minnesota, during the 1989-90 school year because IBM assigned his father, Koji, to work in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. As ...

The Sunwolves kick off their 2019 Super Rugby season on Saturday in the heat and humidity of Singapore against the Durban-based Sharks, and co-captain Michael Little would have it no other way. "South African guys are pretty big in general so what better place to ...

Rika Kihira said Friday she aims to cap her remarkable senior debut season with a world championship. The 16-year-old, who won the women's individual titles at this season's ISU Grand Prix Final and Four Continents Championships, held an open practice with Pyeongchang Olympian Satoko Miyahara ...

The San Diego Padres have doubled down on their pursuit of free agent infielder Manny Machado. Padres general manager A.J. Preller flew to Miami last week to have a second meeting with Machado, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. Multiple media outlets subsequently confirmed ...

World No. 7 Kei Nishikori breezed past Latvian lucky loser Ernests Gulbis 6-1, 6-4 on Thursday to reach the quarterfinals of the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament, an ATP 500 indoor hardcourt stop in Rotterdam. The top-seeded Japanese raced out to a 5-0 lead in ...

Colin Kaepernick, the quarterback whose NFL career was cut short after he knelt in protest during the national anthem, would still have a job if he were a basketball player, according to former NBA commissioner David Stern. Speaking on the "Bloomberg Business of Sports" podcast, ...