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April 14, 2025
 

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Yukana Inoue
Shinji Ishimaru in June 2024
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Apr 11, 2025
Tokyo hopeful's campaign team accused of election law violation
The complaint alleges that Ishimaru's election team paid a company to livestream a gathering on YouTube that was held two days before the gubernatorial election.
Cherry blossoms in full bloom at Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo on March 30
JAPAN / Science & Health
Apr 10, 2025
AI app helps monitor cherry tree health and keep hanami tradition blooming
As Japan celebrates cherry blossom season, aging trees pose safety risks — and a new AI app is helping track their condition.
Stockpiled rice at a rice-polishing factory in Saitama Prefecture in March
JAPAN
Apr 9, 2025
Japan to release stockpiled rice monthly amid record high prices
The move comes after two previous releases appeared to have had little effect in stabilizing prices.
Ryoko Hirosue
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Apr 8, 2025
Actor Ryoko Hirosue arrested for allegedly injuring medical staffer
Hirosue was in a “panicked state” and injured the medical staff member, her agency said in a statement.
A Fuchu expressway entrance in western Tokyo is closed Sunday due to a glitch in the Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) system.
JAPAN
Apr 7, 2025
Tollbooths now operational after ETC malfunction causes mass confusion
It was the first time such a large-scale problem involving the ETC system has occurred since Japanese expressways were privatized in 2005.
Victims of scam centers who were tricked or trafficked into working in Myanmar gather at a compound inside KK Park, a fraud center on the country's border with Thailand, after a multinational crackdown in February.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal / FOCUS
Apr 2, 2025
A new human trafficking trend emerges from Myanmar scam centers
Syndicates are increasingly targeting middle- to upper-class individuals from across the world through something as harmless as online video games.
Lawyer Akira Takeuchi (center), the head of a third-party panel commissioned by Fuji TV to investigate a series of scandals at the broadcaster, fields questions along with other panel members at a news conference on Monday in Tokyo's Minato Ward.
JAPAN / Media / FOCUS
Apr 1, 2025
What the Fuji TV third-party probe uncovered
The panel concluded that TV personality Masahiro Nakai committed "sexual violence" against a female newscaster and that there is a culture of harassment at the broadcaster.
The headquarters of Fuji Media Holdings, Fuji TV's parent, in Tokyo's Minato Ward
JAPAN / Media
Mar 31, 2025
Fuji TV bears heavy responsibility over Nakai's 'sexual violence': panel
A third party panel's probe on a series of scandals involving the broadcaster and the TV star acknowledged the nature of his "trouble" with a woman for the first time.
How Fuji TV responds to the results of a third-party probe will be crucial to restoring public trust — and could determine whether sponsors, whose TV ads are the company's main source of revenue, choose to return.
JAPAN
Mar 28, 2025
Fuji TV returns to spotlight as deadline for scandal probe looms
How Fuji TV responds to the report will be crucial to restoring public trust — and could determine whether sponsors choose to return.
Hisashi Hieda, a 41-year veteran of Fuji TV’s board of directors and dubbed the broadcaster’s “emperor,” has stepped down.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 27, 2025
In the wake of several scandals, Fuji TV ‘emperor’ Hieda steps down
Hieda, a 41-year veteran of Fuji TV’s board of directors, also plans to step down as chairman of the Fujisankei Communications Group, of which the broadcaster's parent is a part.
Cherry blossoms along a road in Tokyo on Tuesday. The 2025 cherry blossom season is expected to have an economic impact of around ¥1.39 trillion on Japan.
JAPAN
Mar 26, 2025
Hanami season to have record ¥1.39 trillion economic impact on Japan
The estimate is 22.2% higher than last year's ¥1.14 trillion, according to an annual report compiled by Kansai University economist Katsuhiro Miyamoto.
Smoke from a wildfire in the city of Okayama on Monday. The fire had subsided by Tuesday while a separate wildfire in Ehime Prefecture continues to spread.
JAPAN
Mar 25, 2025
Ehime wildfire blazes on while Okayama's begins to burn out
The wildfire in Ehime Prefecture had spread to cover 171 hectares by Tuesday, although no building damage has been reported.
A photo posted on the X account for the transport ministry's Matsuyama branch in Ehime Prefecture shows a wildfire in the city of Imabari on Sunday night.
JAPAN
Mar 24, 2025
Firefighters and SDF battle wildfires spreading in Okayama and Ehime
This is the second time the country has seen an unusually large wildfire in recent weeks, following one in Iwate Prefecture last month.
Mount Fuji in November. For the first time, the government has released specific guidelines on how residents should act in the event that Mount Fuji erupts.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 21, 2025
Stay at home if Mount Fuji erupts, government panel says
Residents are recommended to store more than a week's worth of emergency supplies at home because volcanic eruptions can last longer than that.
Bags of the government's rice stockpile are shipped out of a warehouse in Saitama Prefecture on Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 18, 2025
Portion of government rice stockpile to hit shelves as early as next week
In a bid to stop the surging price of rice, the government auctioned off a portion of its emergency stockpile.
Tokyo will soon require all companies in the city to make efforts to stop harassment by customers, such as by creating a manual on how to handle suspected cases.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 17, 2025
Tokyo gears up for April launch of law against harassment by customers
All companies in Tokyo must make an effort to eliminate such harassment, such as by creating a manual on how to handle suspected cases.
People in Japan appeared to have the smallest difference between the amount of sleep they get on weekdays and weekends, suggesting the lowest incidence of social jet lag.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Mar 14, 2025
People in Japan get the least sleep, Pokemon study finds
Does that make Japan the land of the never-setting sun?
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt holds up a piece of paper with information about tariff rates at the White House on Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 12, 2025
The U.S. says Japan has a 700% tariff on American rice. Is that the case?
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt's accusation describes only a small portion of U.S. rice imported by Japan.
The government's stockpile of rice in Saitama Prefecture in February
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2025
For first time ever, government begins auction of rice stockpile
Rice from the stockpile is expected to hit shelves from around the end of the month.
Firefighters battle a wildfire in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, on Thursday.
JAPAN
Mar 6, 2025
Wildfire slows in Iwate as government announces relief support
The city saw 26.5 millimeters of rain on Wednesday, far exceeding the 2.5mm total for the entire month of February.
China halts critical rare earth exports as trade war intensifies
Workers transport soil containing rare earth elements for export at a port in Lianyungang, in China's Jiangsu province, in October 2010.
Osaka Expo throws open its doors as mega-event kicks off
People visit the Osaka Expo on the first day it opened to the public, in the city of Osaka on Sunday.
A new tour of Tokyo’s most underground attraction
When you stare into the abyss at the bottom of the No. 3 shaft of the Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel, the abyss stares back.
How to spend the perfect day in Hiroo, Tokyo’s expat enclave
Customers line up patiently for some early-afternoon baked goods outside Truffle, which is located close to Hiroo Station on the Hibiya Line.
Japan doesn’t plan to use U.S. Treasurys as tariff talk leverage
Liberal Democratic Party policy chief Itsunori Onodera speaks at LDP headquarters in Tokyo last October.
A new tour of Tokyo’s most underground attraction
When you stare into the abyss at the bottom of the No. 3 shaft of the Metropolitan Area Outer Underground Discharge Channel, the abyss stares back.
Osaka Expo-bound? Take your pick of the city’s new luxury hotels.
The Four Seasons Hotel Osaka opened in 2024, just one of many new luxury accommodations the city boasts ahead of the 2025 World Expo.
Heaven from hells: The sulfuric pleasure of Unzen Onsen
While Unzen Onsen's "hells" can be visually striking, locals describe them and their effects as "a source of emotional healing."
Osaka Expo throws open its doors as mega-event kicks off
People visit the Osaka Expo on the first day it opened to the public, in the city of Osaka on Sunday.
Japan’s NATO envoy targets industrial tie-ups to boost defense supply chains
Japanese Ambassador to NATO Osamu Izawa (left) meets with the alliance's secretary-general, Mark Rutte, at NATO headquarters in Brussels recently.

Podcast

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

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.
By Tomoko Otake

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