Category Archives: Japan

Rishi Sunak arrives in Japan to announce defence pact

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PM also says Japanese businesses have invested £18bn in UK as he visits country for G7 summit

Rishi Sunak has arrived in Tokyo to announce a new defence partnership with Japan and support £18bn of private business deals, ahead of the G7 summit aimed at addressing the threats of Russia and China.

Before the gathering of world leaders in Hiroshima on Friday, Sunak is meeting Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, to discuss more defence cooperation in the face of China’s increasing belligerence towards Taiwan.

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As G7 leaders start to arrive, Japan PM prepares push in Hiroshima for nuclear weapons pledge

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Ukraine and China’s Taiwan ambitions are expected to dominate summit discussions, but Fumio Kishida will have a powerful backdrop

The war in Ukraine and Chinese aggression towards Taiwan will dominate G7 discussions this week, but host Fumio Kishida is expected to carve out time to push for a pledge on nuclear weapons when leaders meet in Hiroshima, the first place on Earth targeted by an atomic bomb.

The leaders began to arrive on Thursday, ahead of an expected visit on Saturday to the city’s Peace Memorial Museum, which contains exhibits showing the scale of the tragedy that unfolded after the US dropped a nuclear bomb on the morning of 6 August 1945, killing 140,000 people by the end of the year.

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Rishi Sunak seeks to build stronger defence with Japan at Tokyo G7

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PM expected to unveil Hiroshima accord at meeting with Japan’s Fumio Kishida amid fears of China’s rising militarisation

Rishi Sunak will seek to build a stronger defence with Japan amid fears of China’s rising militarisation as he travels to Tokyo and Hiroshima for the G7 summit.

The prime minister will be accompanied by his wife, Akshata Murty, on their first official visit since he entered No 10 for the meeting of leaders from the US, France, Germany, Canada, Japan, Italy and the EU.

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Former world leaders urge G7 to get nuclear arms control back on track

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Exclusive: Letter calls on US and Russia to isolate weapons agreements from other disputes

A global array of former world leaders and defence ministers, nuclear experts and diplomats have called on the leaders of G7 countries at their meeting in Hiroshima, Japan, not to let progress on nuclear arms control continue to be the victim of growing geopolitical conflict, including the conflict between the west and Russia over Ukraine.

The Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, who is from Hiroshima, chose the G7 venue to lend seriousness to his personal call to world leaders to at least agree a roadmap to resume nuclear arms control talks.

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Quad summit cancelled after Joe Biden calls off trip to Australia

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Leaders of Japan, India, US and Australia will instead meet on sidelines of the G7 in Hiroshima this weekend

Anthony Albanese has confirmed the Sydney Quad meeting will not go ahead, after US president Joe Biden pulled out of his Australian visit to deal with domestic issues.

Early Wednesday morning Albanese was still hopeful the meeting with the leaders of India and Japan could proceed with a senior representative from the US, but hours later he confirmed the event was off.

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Joe Biden cancels Australian visit amid US domestic debt deadlock

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President had been due to address parliament next week, the first US leader in 10 years to do so, as part of Asia tour

President Joe Biden has cancelled a visit to Australia, the second leg of his upcoming Asia trip, due to the slow-motion crisis building in Washington over the US debt ceiling.

Biden is to attend a three-day summit of G7 leaders that starts on Friday in Hiroshima, Japan, and will return to the US on Sunday.

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Grin and bare it: as mask mandates end Japan turns to tutors to relearn how to smile

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‘Smile education’ coach Keiko Kawano says more and more people have developed a ‘complex’ about smiling

After three years of concealing their mouths behind masks, some Japanese people are turning to specialist smile tutors to relearn the art of breaking into a beaming grin without looking awkward.

Since lifting the official advice to wear masks to help prevent the spread of Covid-19, many people have admitted to struggling to adjust to life without face coverings, with some confessing they have forgotten how to smile.

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Japanese talent agency apologises over claims founder sexually abused boys

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Johnny Kitagawa’s niece issues apology to men who have made abuse claims while not commenting on veracity of allegations

The president of one of Japan’s most powerful talent agencies has apologised over allegations that the firm’s late founder and pop impresario, Johnny Kitagawa, sexually abused multiple boys.

In a video and statement released on Sunday evening, Julie Fujishima, Kitagawa’s niece, issued the apology to young men who had stepped forward with abuse claims, although she did not comment on the veracity of the allegations.

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Japanese PM expresses sympathy with Korean victims of colonial rule

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Fumio Kishida pays reciprocal visit to Yoon Suk-yeol as rows over Japanese occupation are soothed

Japan’s prime minister has expressed sympathy for the suffering of Korean forced labourers during Japan’s colonial rule, as he and his South Korean counterpart renewed their resolve to overcome historical grievances and strengthen cooperation in the face of shared challenges such as North Korea’s nuclear programme.

Comments by the Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, on Sunday during his second summit in less than two months with the South Korean president, Yoon Suk Yeol, are being closely watched in Seoul.

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Nato planning to open Japan office to deepen Asia-Pacific ties – report

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Liaison office plans likely to attract criticism from China which has warned against the western alliance extending into Asia

Nato is reportedly planning to open a liaison office in Japan to coordinate with close partners across the Indo-Pacific region including Australia, South Korea and New Zealand.

The plans are likely to attract criticism from the Chinese government, which has previously warned the western alliance against extending “its tentacles to the Asia-Pacific”.

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Japan approves abortion pill for the first time

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Health ministry gives green light to two-step treatment made by British pharmaceutical firm Linepharma

The abortion pill will become available in Japan for the first time after the health ministry approved a drug used to terminate early-stage pregnancies.

Abortion is legal in Japan up to 22 weeks, but consent is usually required from a spouse or partner, and until now a surgical procedure had been the only option.

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Japan pledges to have women in third of top boardroom roles by 2030

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Prime minister Fumio Kishida says diversity in listed companies is key to ‘achieving new capitalism and an inclusive society’

Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, has said he wants almost a third of executive positions at the country’s top companies to be occupied by women by the end of the decade.

In an apparent attempt to address Japan’s poor record on gender equality ahead of the G7 leaders’ summit in Hiroshima next month, Kishida said more boardroom diversity would boost the world’s third-biggest economy.

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Last images taken by Japanese journalist killed in Myanmar in 2007 released

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News outlet obtains camera of Kenji Nagai, who was reporting on Saffron Revolution when he was shot

The family of a Japanese journalist killed while reporting on Myanmar’s 2007 Saffron Revolution have released his last pictures, sharing footage from a recently obtained video camera missing since his fatal shooting 15 years ago.

The final pictures from 50-year-old Kenji Nagai during an anti-government protest were obtained by Myanmar-focused news outlet the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), which returned the camera on Wednesday to Nagai’s family in Bangkok.

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Japan’s ispace says moon lander probably crashed on lunar surface

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Hakuto-R may have miscalculated altitude, says company after losing contact with spacecraft

Japan’s ispace said its attempt to make the first private moon landing had failed after losing contact with its Hakuto-R Mission 1 (M1) lander when it unexpectedly accelerated and probably crashed on the lunar surface.

The startup said it was possible that as the lander approached the moon, its altitude measurement system had miscalculated the distance to the surface.

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Poached sea cucumber: Japan police arrest five for stealing 600kg of the coveted creature

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Japan’s criminal syndicates have increasingly targeted the marine animal which is considered an expensive delicacy

Police in Japan have arrested several people for allegedly poaching a huge haul of sea cucumbers – an unsightly but expensive delicacy that has attracted the attention of the country’s crime syndicates.

The five men were arrested for stealing more than 600kg of the marine creates in seas off Fukuoka, south-east Japan, in what local media are calling one of the largest sea cucumber-poaching incidents since the echinoderms achieved coveted status among criminals several years ago.

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Japanese firm’s pioneering moon landing fails

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Ispace loses communication with Hakuto-R lunar lander, ending a mission that began more than four months ago

A Japanese startup attempting the first private landing on the moon has lost communication with its spacecraft and said that it assumes the lunar mission had failed.

Ispace said that it could not establish communication with the uncrewed Hakuto-R lunar lander after its expected landing time, a frustrating end to a mission that began with a launch from the US more than four months ago.

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Japan’s ‘crying baby sumo’ festival returns for first time since pandemic

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Staff wearing demon masks try to make competing babies cry, with the first to bawl declared the winner in a centuries-old tradition

Dozens of bawling Japanese babies faced off in a traditional “crying sumo” ritual believed to bring the infants good health, which returned for the first time in four years after the pandemic.

Pairs of toddlers wearing ceremonial sumo aprons were held up by their parents and faced each other in the sumo ring at Sensoji Temple in Tokyo on Saturday.

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Montevideo Maru: wreck of ship sunk in Australia’s worst maritime disaster found after 80 years

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About 1,060 WWII prisoners died when the ship, which has now been found in the South China Sea, was sunk by an American missile in 1942

The wreck of a ship caught up in Australia’s worst ever maritime disaster has been found 4,000 metres under the sea, 80 years after it was torpedoed by an American submarine.

The Montevideo Maru, discovered off the coast of the Philippines, sank with about 980 Australian troops and civilians on board – almost twice as many Australians killed than during the Vietnam war.

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DeSantis to meet UK foreign secretary with eye on US presidential bid

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Florida governor lines up four-nation tour in attempt to boost credentials as credible leader on world stage

Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, is to meet the UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, in London at the end of the month as he attempts to burnish his credentials as a credible Republican leader capable of operating on a global stage ahead of a widely expected run for US president.

He is to lead a Florida trade delegation on a four-nation tour taking in Japan, South Korea, Israel and the UK.

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Japan’s PM gives G7 security pledge after pipe bomb attack

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Security tightened ahead of summit in Hiroshima next month after incident on Saturday

Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, has vowed to ensure the safety of politicians and officials attending this year’s round of G7 meetings, days after he escaped unharmed after apparently being targeted in a pipe bomb attack.

The incident on Saturday came as foreign ministers began three days of talks in Japan, this year’s G7 president, that will be followed by other high-level meetings culminating in the leaders’ summit in Hiroshima in May.

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