Search - japan

 
 
Masamune Goto (front) pilots his boat during a powerboat racing competition at Tokyo's Tamagawa boat course on Feb. 23.
MORE SPORTS
Mar 6, 2025

Powerboat racing revs up bid to shed shadowy reputation in Japan

Powerboat racing started more than 70 years ago under a special gambling law that classifies it alongside horse racing, speedway and cycling in Japan.
Yoko Suetsugu at Haco, her gallery in New York
JAPAN / Society / Regional Voices: Fukushima
Mar 17, 2025

Sculptor connects Fukushima to U.S. through New York gallery

Yoko Suetsugu is aiming to launch a program inviting U.S. artists to hot springs in the city of Fukushima for a creative retreat.
Ayako Urasawa shows a skirt with a pocket too shallow to hold a smartphone.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 7, 2025

Women in Japan call for clothing that has pockets

Many women's jackets, pants and skirts either lack pockets or have only shallow pockets.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba with parliamentary vice ministers at the Prime Minister's Office in November. The share of women among Japan's lawmakers was 15.7% as of last December.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 7, 2025

Japan's share of female lawmakers lowest among G7 members

While the global average was 27.2%, the figure in Japan stood at 15.7% as of last December.
Italian President Sergio Mattarella lays flowers on Saturday before the cenotaph for the victims of the 1945 atomic bombing at Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima.
JAPAN
Mar 9, 2025

Italian president lays flowers at Hiroshima Peace Park

The president observed a moment of silent in front of the cenotaph and then toured the park, accompanied by Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui.
Oto, Japan's oldest lion, died Monday at Toyohashi Zoo & Botanical Park in Toyohashi, Aichi Prefecture.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Mar 10, 2025

Oto, Japan’s oldest lion, dies at 25 — equivalent to 100 human years

Born in 1999 at Asahiyama Zoo in the city of Asahikawa, Hokkaido, Oto had been at Aichi Prefecture's Toyohashi Zoo & Botanical Park since 2001.
The law will require scrap metal dealers to verify the identity of sellers during transactions.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 11, 2025

Japan moves to curb metal theft with new identity check laws

Metal theft has surged in recent years, driven by rising copper prices.
People observe a moment of silence at 2:46 p.m. on Tuesday in Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, when the Great East Japan Earthquake hit 14 years ago. Behind them is a pine tree dubbed "the miracle tree" that survived the tsunami.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 11, 2025

Japan marks 14 years since 3/11 earthquake, with over 27,000 still displaced

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said he will pass down the lessons of the disaster to future generations.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba enters the Prime Minister's Office on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 13, 2025

Ishiba mulls visit to Iwo Jima, site of fierce WWII battle

He plans to attend a joint Japan-U.S. memorial service on March 29, which would make him the first Japanese prime minister since April 2013 to set foot on the remote island.
A construction site in Tokyo in July 2018. Businesses failing to take measures to prevent severe heatstroke among employees will be subjected to criminal punishment from June.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Mar 13, 2025

Japan to get tough on businesses not taking heatstroke countermeasures

Violators will be punishable with up to six months' imprisonment or a maximum fine of ¥500,000 ($3,380).
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and others attend a Cabinet meeting on Friday at the Prime Minister's Office
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 14, 2025

Japan touts benefits of foreign development aid

Japanese aid has helped the country win trust globally, the government said in an annual white paper.
The Great Wall of China near Beijing. Two Japanese tourists were detained in China for taking photos showing exposed buttocks at the World Heritage site.
JAPAN
Mar 14, 2025

China deports Japanese tourists over Great Wall buttocks pic, reports state

The tourists reportedly told the Japanese embassy they did it as a prank.
According to the Nippon Bonsai Growers Cooperative, there were about 30 cases of bonsai theft last year.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 14, 2025

Bonsai thefts sweep Japan as miniature trees grow more popular

About 30 cases of such theft occurred last year, according to the Nippon Bonsai Growers Cooperative.
Rail enthusiasts and local residents hold up a specially designed banner for arriving and departing trains at Higashi-Nemuro Station in Nemuro, Hokkaido, on Friday, the station's final day of operation.
JAPAN
Mar 14, 2025

People bid farewell to Japan's easternmost train station

As the number of users is unlikely to recover from a prolonged decline, JR Hokkaido has decided to close the station.
Yoji Muto
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 15, 2025

Japan, China and South Korea eye trade ministers meeting

Japanese trade minister Yoji Muto will attend the envisaged meeting if he receives parliamentary approval.
Junichi Yasuda’s surprise hit “A Samurai in Time” won the award for best film at the 48th Japan Academy Film Prize ceremony.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 15, 2025

‘A Samurai in Time’ wins top prize at Japan’s premier film event

This country’s answer to the Oscars also saw awards go to “Oppenheimer” and “Faceless.”
Then-Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa presents a gift to a Ukrainian refugee during the Women, Peace and Security session as part of the Japan-Ukraine Conference for Promotion of Economic Growth and Reconstruction at the Japan Business Federation in February last year.
JAPAN
Mar 15, 2025

Japan recognized 1,661 'quasi-refugees' in 2024

Protection was given to 1,618 Ukrainians, 17 people from Syria, 13 from Myanmar, 11 from Sudan, and one each from Afghanistan and Uzbekistan.
Bank of Japan headquarters building in February. In January, the BOJ voted to raise its short-term policy rate to 0.5% from 0.25%, taking it to the highest level since the 2008 financial crisis.
BUSINESS / Markets
Mar 17, 2025

Bank of Japan unlikely to raise rates this week as trade war intensifies

The central bank voted to raise its short-term policy rate to 0.5% from 0.25% in January, taking it to the highest level since the 2008 financial crisis.
A MI-8 helicopter from the Belarus army carries the Belarusian national flag in Minsk in 2017.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 18, 2025

Belarus sentences Japanese man to seven years for spying

The man allegedly took photos of military facilities as well as railway infrastructure, and had traveled to the Ukrainian border.
Emergency medical workers treat victims of the sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system at a makeshift shelter before they are transported to hospitals on March 20, 1995.
JAPAN
Mar 18, 2025

Japan to preserve medical records from 1995 sarin attack

The health ministry will also interview medical professionals who treated the victims and compile oral records.
Japan's cyberdefense legislation is designed for the government to acquire and analyze communication information in normal times.
JAPAN
Mar 18, 2025

Japan's active cyberdefense bills include normal-time monitoring

The bills also call for establishing an independent organization to supervise cyberdefense operations and file relevant reports to parliament.
The Environment Ministry plans to have recycled plastics account for at least 15% of overall plastics used in the production of new vehicle models, at a time when the European Union is looking to make using recycled plastics mandatory in vehicle production.
JAPAN
Mar 18, 2025

Japan aims to use 15% recycled plastics in auto production

Recycled plastics have rarely been used in vehicle production in Japan due to poor quality and insufficient supply.
Myanmar from Thailand's side of the border, in the Mae Sot district on Feb. 5. Osaka police plan to arrest a Japanese man — who is being detained in Thailand for allegedly forcing a Japanese high school student to participate in a fraud scheme in Myanmar — on suspicion he imprisoned an acquaintance in Osaka last year.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 18, 2025

Osaka police to arrest Japanese man detained in Thailand

The arrest could happen as early as March 25, after he is transferred to Japan from Thailand.
Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda speaks during a news conference in January in Tokyo.
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 19, 2025

Bank of Japan holds steady at 0.5% as trade war escalates and inflation rises

The move was widely expected, with economists unanimous in seeing back-to-back rate increases as unlikely from the central bank, which made one in January.
Tourists visit a park in front of the Imperial Palace amid snowfall in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Mar 19, 2025

Japan's record snow in February attributed to global warming

The Meteorological Agency said global warming contributed to the record snowfall in northern and eastern Japan last month.
The number of foreign visitors to Japan exceeded 3 million in February, the first time for the month.
JAPAN
Mar 19, 2025

Japan records 3.25 million visitors in February

The number shot up 16.9% from a year before, boosted mainly by an increase in travelers from China during the Lunar New Year holiday period.
Women's March Tokyo, a demonstration march against sexual violence and discrimination against women, is held on International Women's Day in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward on March 8.
JAPAN
Mar 20, 2025

Women remain underrepresented in Japan's news industry

Correcting the gender gap is an urgent issue in the industry, with such a change expected to bring women's perspectives to newsrooms.
It has become the government's urgent priority to address the issue of an acute labor shortage in the Self-Defense Forces, as recruitment has consistently fallen short of targets.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Mar 21, 2025

Higher pay and career support planned to help boost Japan's SDF ranks

Recruitment for the Self-Defense Forces has consistently fallen short of targets, with only about 10,000 personnel hired in fiscal 2023 — half of the quota of about 20,000.
Natsue Kondo (left) assumes the post of the Maritime Self-Defense Force's vice admiral commanding the MSDF's Ominato District, based in Mutsu, Aomori Prefecture, in December 2023.
JAPAN
Mar 21, 2025

Natsue Kondo: The female vice admiral who broke the glass ceiling at Japan's SDF

The MSDF vice admiral remains the only female SDF officer holding any of the top ranks.
More companies are offering tailored solutions for the unique health and wellness needs of men.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 21, 2025

'Mentech' starts gaining traction in Japan

Inspired by products and services catering specifically to women, mentech aims to provide tailored solutions to meet the health and wellness needs of men.

Longform

Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell