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November 21, 2025
 

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JAPANESE COURTS

An illustration of Tetsuya Yamagami (left) being questioned by his lawyer on Thursday at the Nara District Court
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 21, 2025
‘I should not have lived this long,’ man accused of killing Abe tells court
Describing his troubled upbringing and the misery caused by his mother’s devotion to the Unification Church, Tetsuya Yamagami expressed regret over the killing.
Cloudflare has been ordered to pay ¥500 million after four major publishing firms accused the firm of copyright infringement for its role in hosting sites that distribute pirated copies of manga titles.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 20, 2025
Japanese court orders Cloudflare to pay ¥500 million over manga piracy
Four major publishing firms accused Cloudflare of copyright infringement for its role in hosting sites that distribute pirated copies of manga titles.
The mother of the man on trial for the 2022 killing of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told the Nara District Court that she feels responsible for her son’s actions.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 19, 2025
Even after Abe’s death, suspect’s mother stays faithful to Unification Church
The church’s influence on Tetsuya Yamagami's family has become a focal point of his trial, as a grudge he said he held against it had led him to target the prime minister.
A building housing the welfare ministry in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward
JAPAN
Nov 17, 2025
Panel OKs smaller cuts to welfare benefits
The government plans to finalize the benefit amounts by the end of this month based on the welfare ministry panel's proposal.
Iwao Hakamata's legal team heads to the Shizuoka District Court in the city of Shizuoka on Oct. 9 after Hakamata, a former death row inmate who was acquitted in a retrial for the 1966 murder of a family in Shizuoka Prefecture, filed a damages lawsuit against the central and prefectural governments.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 17, 2025
Ban on prosecutors' appeals in retrials wins expert support
For Iwao Hakamata, a man who was acquitted of murdering four people in a retrial, it took about nine years for the decision to start a retrial to become final because of appeals.
Hirohide Mori (left), head of the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor's Office's public security division, and Tetsuro Kamata, deputy superintendent-general of Tokyo's Metropolitan Police Department, bow toward former Ohkawara Kakohki executive Junji Shimada (second from right) and company President Masaaki Okawara in June in Yokohama.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 16, 2025
Ohkawara Kakohki seeks audit on Tokyo investigator liability
The audit will be conducted within 60 days. If the company disagrees with the outcome, it may file a resident lawsuit.
"I sincerely apologize from the bottom of my heart for the terrible crime committed by my second son, Tetsuya," the mother of Tetsuya Yamagami, who is charged with the 2022 murder of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, said at the start of her testimony Thursday at the seventh hearing of his lay-judge trial at Nara District Court.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 14, 2025
Mother of Abe shooter Yamagami apologizes in court
"I sincerely apologize from the bottom of my heart for the terrible crime committed by my second son, Tetsuya," said the mother, a follower of the Unification Church.
A Saitama district court sentenced Deng Hongpeng, a Chinese national and demolition worker, to two years and six months in prison, suspended for four years, for hitting a group of elementary school children with his car and fleeing the scene while driving under the influence.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 13, 2025
Chinese national sentenced for hit-and-run that injured four children in Saitama
Demolition worker Deng Hongpeng was driving under the influence and struck a group of ten children, injuring four sixth-grade boys.
Seiichi Katsurada, president of tour boat operator Shiretoko Yuransen, bows in front of the Kushiro District Court on Wednesday prior to the first hearing of his trial.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 12, 2025
Head of Hokkaido tour boat operator pleads not guilty over fatal sinking
The operator’s president apologized to the bereaved families of the accident, which left 20 passengers and crew members dead and six others unaccounted for.
A police witness told Nara District Court on Thursday that all seven guns made by Tetsuya Yamagami, charged with murdering former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, were lethal.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 7, 2025
Police witness says Abe shooter's homemade guns were all lethal
The witness is a researcher at the Nara prefectural police department's forensic laboratory who analyzed the homemade guns.
The Osaka District Court sentenced a 25-year-old man to four years and six months in prison for swindling ¥1.45 billion in a real estate scam.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 6, 2025
Osaka real estate scammer given 54-month prison sentence
Judge Akira Kuranari ruled that the defendant, Ryohei Kume, took part in "a malicious crime with sophisticated tricks" by posing as a landowner.
A group of 1,191 people across Japan has filed a petition seeking the return of about ¥11.4 billion from an Osaka-based real estate investment firm.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 6, 2025
More than 1,100 people sue Osaka firm over real estate investment
Some who terminated their investment contracts with Toshi-Souken Invest have not been refunded, according to the group of petitioners.
Lawyers who filed a lawsuit over the July Upper House election hold up a sign saying “state of unconstitutionality” Tuesday in Matsue, Shimane Prefecture, following a ruling by the Hiroshima High Court’s Matsue branch.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Nov 5, 2025
Another court finds July Upper House poll held in unconstitutional state
The Matsue branch of the Hiroshima High Court ruled that the July election was held in a “state of unconstitutionality” due to vote-value disparities of up to 3.13 times.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara (center) and other ministers prior to a Cabinet meeting at the Prime Minister’s Office on Friday
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 31, 2025
Japan to introduce joint child custody system in April 2026
A system of statutory child support will also be introduced on the same date.
The mother of a deceased male inmate of a juvenile detention facility who filed a lawsuit over the medical treatment he had received while detained speaks during a news conference in Tokyo Thursday following a ruling ordering the state to pay damages.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 31, 2025
Tokyo court orders state to pay damages following inmate’s death
The dispute centered on whether a medical exam conducted in January 2020 at the juvenile detention branch had been appropriate given the man was later diagnosed with cancer.
Sotatsu Yanase, a 46-year-old tatami shop owner, was sentenced to 2 years and 6 months in prison by the Tokyo District Court on Thursday for burning his girlfriend's body and dumping it in the sea off Izu Oshima.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 30, 2025
Tokyo court sentences man to 30 months in prison for burning girlfriend’s body
According to the indictment, Sotatsu Yanase abandoned his girlfriend's remains in 2024 near Izu Oshima's southwest coast, with police still investigating how she died.
Journalists gather at the Nara District Court as a vehicle believed to be carrying Tetsuya Yamagami arrives on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 30, 2025
Lawmaker Kei Sato testifies at Abe shooter trial
Sato, who witnessed the shooting, expressed his resentment and grief over the fatal attack.
Flotation devices from the missing tour boat Kazu 1 drift at a rocky coastal area of the Shiretoko Peninsula in Shari, Hokkaido, in April 2022.
JAPAN
Oct 29, 2025
First hearing on fatal Hokkaido tour boat sinking set for Nov. 12
The Kazu I tour boat sank off the Shiretoko Peninsula in April 2022, killing 20 of its 26 passengers and crew members and leaving the other six missing.
Lawyer Hidetoshi Masunaga (front, left) and others seeking the invalidation of the July Upper House election walk to the Nagoya High Court's Kanazawa branch on Oct. 1.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 29, 2025
Court finds July poll was held in an unconstitutional state
A group of lawyers sought the invalidation of the Upper House election.
The Tokyo headquarters of the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, also known as the Unification Church
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 29, 2025
Hearings on Unification Church dissolution order to end in November
The church had allegedly inspired the fatal shooting of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe three years ago.
Japanese court orders Cloudflare to pay ¥500 million over manga piracy
Cloudflare has been ordered to pay ¥500 million after four major publishing firms accused the firm of copyright infringement for its role in hosting sites that distribute pirated copies of manga titles.
The reality of human trafficking in Japan
A view of Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward at night. Last year in Japan, 66 people were put in protective custody as victims of human trafficking. Among them, 58 — including all 41 minors — were Japanese nationals. International pressure to act on human trafficking led Japan to make efforts to crack down on the crime, such as a tightening of conditions in 2005 for entertainer visas.
Beware of China’s strategic distortion of reality
China holds a military parade to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, in Beijing on Sept. 3. 
Yen rout brings talk of ¥160 to the dollar and possible intervention
The yen has been weak against the U.S. dollar in recent weeks, with some analysts expecting the retreat to continue.
China to reimpose ban on Japanese seafood imports amid row over Taiwan, reports say
A sign reading, "Suspend the sales of all fish products imported from Japan" is displayed in an area home to Japanese restaurants in Beijing in August 2023. China will reimpose a ban on imports of Japanese seafood, media reports in Tokyo said Wednesday, as a diplomatic spat between the two countries deepens.
First foreign president of Hosei University looks abroad for change
Hosei University President Diana Khor, who herself was an international student, aims to encourage students to look outward and cultivate a global mindset.
Japanese companies advised to change mindset about investment in Africa
Bernard Laurendeau, chief of Enkopa Lab Japan, in Tokyo last month
Munetaka Murakami headlines quartet looking to move to MLB via posting system
The Swallows' Munetaka Murakami has 246 career home runs in eight NPB seasons.
The reality of human trafficking in Japan
A view of Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward at night. Last year in Japan, 66 people were put in protective custody as victims of human trafficking. Among them, 58 — including all 41 minors — were Japanese nationals. International pressure to act on human trafficking led Japan to make efforts to crack down on the crime, such as a tightening of conditions in 2005 for entertainer visas.
Why we can’t get enough of the sham of the rental family
“Rental Family,” directed and co-written by the single-named Hikari, follows out-of-work actor Phillip (Brendan Fraser), who is hired as the “token white guy” at a Tokyo agency called Rental Family.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

An illustration features the Japanese signs for "ganbare" (good luck) and the Deaflympics, which will be held between Nov. 15 and 26.
A century of Deaf sport finds its moment in Tokyo
By Kathryn Wortley

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