NAGANO (Kyodo) A woman and a man were found dead about 100 meters apart in the Northern Alps' Happo mountain range in Hakuba, Nagano Prefecture, local police said.
The police identified them as Mitoko Masuuchi, 50, a town assembly member from Agui, Aichi Prefecture, and Nobuhide Takada, 57, chairman of the Japanese Communist Party's Chita chapter in Showa Ward, Nagoya.
A climber found the woman's body Sunday morning and alerted the police. A search led to the discovery of the man's body in the afternoon, police officials said.
Snow had partially buried the woman's corpse near Lake Happo on a mountain road at an elevation of about 2,080 meters, they said, whole the man's body was found around 100 meters lower down the mountain.