Controversial anti-NHK candidate Takashi Tachibana kicks off by-election campaign in Saitama
Official campaigning began Thursday for the Upper House by-election in Saitama Prefecture, where a former governor is pitted against the head of a minor opposition party critical of public broadcaster NHK. Independent Kiyoshi Ueda, 71, is an established figure after serving as Saitama governor for ...
Japan disqualifies groups supervising foreign trainees in Chiba and Saitama
The Immigration Services Agency and labor ministry have revoked the permits of two organizations that supervise foreign technical trainees, after finding that they had concluded improper deals with agencies seeking to send trainees to Japan. Arrangements entered into by supervisory bodies in the prefectures of ...
Olympic Village subcontractor had ties to yakuza gang, Tokyo police say
A construction company with suspected ties to a yakuza gang participated as a subcontractor in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic athletes village project.
Ex-security worker suspected of mailing ¥360 million in stolen cash to Tokyo post office
A former worker at a security firm suspected of stealing ¥360 million from his employer's office in Saitama Prefecture was arrested Friday after he allegedly mailed the cash in four cardboard boxes to a post office box in Tokyo, prefectural police said. Hiroki Ito, 28, ...
In bid to contain swine fever outbreak, Japan's farm ministry announces plan to vaccinate pigs
The ministry saw the move as inevitable after the first outbreak in the country in 26 years was confirmed in September last year.
Stepfather allegedly killed Saitama boy after child told him he was not his real father
According to the police, the suspect has admitted to murdering the boy and said he hid the body after killing him, sources said.
Murder probe launched after missing Saitama boy found dead, apparently strangled
The body of Ryosuke Shindo, 9, was found near stairs in his apartment building hours after his mother informed the police he had failed to return home from his English conversation school.
Japan still struggling to contain swine fever a year after outbreak began
Japan remains in an uphill battle to contain swine fever a year after confirming its first case of the infectious disease in 26 years. Infections have been found at pig farms in Gifu, where the outbreak began on Sept. 9 last year, and seven other ...
Swine fever spreads to eastern Japan one year after outbreak
Pigs at a farm in Saitama Prefecture have been infected with the swine fever virus, the agriculture ministry has said, as authorities continue to struggle to contain the highly contagious disease one year since it first emerged. The case reported Friday in the Kanto region ...
Debate over Japan's extinct wolf grows
An unidentified animal howl recorded in the Okuchichibu mountains bears a strong resemblance to a wolf howl, according to an analysis of audio samples provided by Hiroshi Yagi, an independent researcher who has been working to prove the existence of the officially extinct Japanese ...
Bullied Japanese teen dies in apparent suicide, blames school in journal
A 15-year-old boy who had complained about being bullied at school died in an apparent suicide after falling from a building in Kawaguchi, Saitama Prefecture, investigative sources said Monday. Shinnosuke Komatsuda, who died Sunday, left a journal entry criticizing his school for its lack of ...
Can a tax rebate persuade Japan's mom-and-pop stores to shift to cashless payments?
Despite the government pushing the opportunity to accelerate Japan’s shift away from cash, many small-business owners are hesitant to change over to cashless payments.
