Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Plastic face shields are almost totally ineffective at trapping respiratory aerosols, according to modelling in Japan, casting doubt on their effectiveness in preventing the spread of coronavirus.
A simulation using Fugaku, the world’s fastest supercomputer, found that almost 100% of airborne droplets of less than 5 micrometres in size escaped through plastic visors of the kind often used by people working in service industries.
Kane Tanaka, who has not been able to see her family due to the pandemic, celebrated with a bottle of Coke
A 117-year-old woman with a weakness for fizzy drinks and chocolate has become Japan’s oldest person on record, as the country marks a public holiday devoted to its senior citizens.
Kane Tanaka, who had already been recognised by the Guinness Book of Records as the world’s oldest living person in March last year, achieved the all-time Japanese age record on Saturday, when she became 117 years and 261 days old.
Deal is the first concrete implementation of the special arrangements for Northern Ireland
A £200m contract to implement Brexit checks on goods in the Irish Sea has been won by a consortium of companies led by Japanese company Fujistu.
HMRC announced on Friday that a two-year contract for the new trader support service (TSS) had been awarded to a consortium led by the tech company and its partners, the Customs Clearance Consortium, an organisation run by customs expert Robert Hardy and the Institute of Export and International Trade.
Outgoing leader holds final cabinet meeting as his successor, Yoshihide Suga, prepares to take over
Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has said he is “proud” of his legacy as he and his cabinet resigned, clearing the way for his successor to take the reins pending parliamentary confirmation on Wednesday.
Abe, Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, announced last month that he was stepping down because of health problems.
‘Humanity at a crossroads’ after a decade in which all of the 2010 Aichi goals to protect wildlife and ecosystems have been missed
The world has failed to meet a single target to stem the destruction of wildlife and life-sustaining ecosystems in the last decade, according to a devastating new report from the UN on the state of nature.
From tackling pollution to protecting coral reefs, the international community did not fully achieve any of the 20 Aichi biodiversity targets agreed in Japan in 2010 to slow the loss of the natural world. It is the second consecutive decade that governments have failed to meet targets.
The favourite may be the Abe continuity candidate but his background could not be more different
Nothing short of force majeure will prevent Yoshihide Suga from becoming Japan’s prime minister when the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP) elects a leader to replace Shinzo Abe this week.
As chief cabinet secretary for almost eight years, Suga has acted as the administration’s de facto second-in-command, batting away tricky questions at twice-daily press briefings, advising Abe on policy and reining in Japan’s recalcitrant bureaucracy.
Agreement in principle comes as Britain races to secure deals before Brexit transition ends
Japan and the UK have agreed a “historic” free trade deal, as Britain races to secure easy access to overseas markets as it prepares to leave the European Union.
“This is a historic moment for the UK and Japan as our first major post-Brexit trade deal,” Liz Truss, the international trade secretary, said after a video call on Friday with the Japanese foreign minister, Toshimitsu Motegi.
Australia’s telling of the Pacific war story is correctly replete with Japanese atrocities. But crimes against Japanese prisoners do not feature prominently
Seventy-five years after the end of the second world war in the Pacific, the human suffering of millions of combatants and civilians is easily overlooked in a binary focus on allied victory and Japanese surrender.
Three-quarters of a century later, Japanese humiliation still simmers in politics and among families of the surrendered or dead. On the other side, meanwhile, countless were the returned soldiers and their families who have long harboured seething hatred for the Japanese.
Dante Addug called his partner as water entered the Gulf Livestock 1 cargo ship but family has not heard from him since
The last time the captain of the Gulf Livestock 1 spoke to his partner, Typhoon Maysak was battering the ship and water was already flowing in. It was 8.30pm on Tuesday.
“He informed her that water had entered the ship. The last thing he said was he will go to the bridge to check the situation,” Maya Addug-Sanchez, the captain’s sister, told the Guardian. Addug’s family hasn’t heard from him since.
Rescuers search for more than 40 crew from ship carrying 6,000 cattle that went down en route from New Zealand to China
A second survivor from a cargo ship carrying 6,000 cattle that capsized off southwest Japan has died after being pulled from the water unconscious on Friday.
The Japanese coast guard said the man had been unresponsive when he was found about 120 km (75 miles) north-northwest of Amami Oshima island and transferred to a hospital.
Lifeboat spotted but strong winds and rain hamper rescue of crew from Philippines, New Zealand and Australia
The Japanese coastguard is looking for a cargo ship carrying livestock and dozens of crew members that went missing after issuing a distress signal during typhoon Maysak.
The Panamanian-registered vessel, called Gulf Livestock 1, sent the distress call from the East China Sea, to the west of Amami Oshima Island in south-western Japan, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported.
Spain recorded 8,115 new cases of Covid-19 on Tuesday evening, 2,731 of them diagnosed in the previous 24 hours, according to the latest figures from the national health ministry.
The latest statistics bring the country’s total to 470,973 cases, of which 99,889 have been logged over the past fortnight. Over the past seven days, 159 people have died from the virus, bringing the death toll to 29,152.
Cuban authorities launched a strict 15-day lockdown of Havana on Tuesday in order to stamp out the low level but persistent spread of coronavirus in the capital.
Aggressive anti-virus measures, including closing down air travel, have virtually eliminated Covid-19 in Cuba with the exception of the capital, where cases have increased from a handful a day to dozens daily over the last month.
Japan's longest-serving prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has announced his resignation, citing ill-health. His departure marks the end of an unusual era of stability in which the Japanese leader struck up strong ties with the US president, Donald Trump, even as Abe's ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China. Although he pulled Japan out of recession, the economy has been battered anew by the coronavirus pandemic
Surprise development comes after Japanese officials were unable to quash speculation following two recent hospital visits by the prime minister
Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, is set to announce his resignation later on Friday, according to public broadcaster NHK, amid growing concerns about his health after he made two hospital visits in the space of a week.
Officials from the governing Liberal Democratic party (LDP) had earlier attempted to quash speculation that Abe may be unable to serve out his term, which was due to end in September 2021, as rumours swirled around the state of his health.
Germany plans to keep fans out of stadiums until at least the end of the year and get tougher on mask-wearing to combat a worrying rise in coronavirus infections, under a draft seen by AFP.
The chancellor Angela Merkel is holding talks with the leaders of Germany’s 16 federal states to officially agree a package of new measures, which will apply nationwide.
The goal of the federal government and the states is to work together to reduce the infection numbers as much as possible.
EU chief Ursula von der Leyen warned top officials to take special care to comply with coronavirus rules after the shock resignation of EU trade boss Phil Hogan.
Her words of caution came just hours after Hogan stepped down after a week of pressure over a breach of coronavirus guidelines in his home country of Ireland.
[As] Europeans make sacrifices and accept painful restrictions, I expect the members of the college to be particularly vigilant about compliance with applicable national or regional rules or recommendations.
Tonight Commissioner @PhilHoganEU submitted his resignation. I respect his decision. I am grateful for his work as a Trade Commissioner and a member of my team. https://t.co/xPcdLX3kmy
Face masks made from non-woven fabric are more effective at blocking the spread of Covid-19 via airborne respiratory droplets than other types that are commonly available, according to modelling in Japan by the world’s fastest supercomputer.
Fugaku, which can perform more than 415 quadrillion computations a second, conducted simulations involving three types of mask, and found that non-woven masks were better than those made of cotton and polyester at blocking spray emitted when the wearer coughs, the Nikkei Asian Review said.
MV Wakashio has split in two and leaked 1,000 tonnes of oil into the water since it ran aground
Salvage crews were preparing to sink a Japanese-owned ship that ran aground off Mauritius, despite opposition from environmental campaigners.
The MV Wakashio broke into two on Saturday, almost three weeks after hitting a reef and spilling 1,000 tonnes of oil into idyllic waters full of marine life.
The coronavirus pandemic has reignited debate in Germany about cutting the working week to four days to help preserve jobs during and after the economic shock.
But the idea remains highly controversial.
Hi everyone, this is Jessica Murray, I’ll be running the global coronavirus blog for the next few hours.
Please do get in touch with any story suggestions or personal experiences you’d like to share.
Police in southern Japan reported more than 7,000 cases of ‘rojo-ne’ last year
Japan is largely tolerant of salarymen snoozing on trains after an evening out, but authorities on the southern island of Okinawa are taking a dim view of a worrying new trend in alcohol-fuelled somnolence.
Local police reported more than 7,000 cases of rojo-ne – literally sleeping on the road – last year, a phenomenon some attribute to Okinawa’s balmy weather and enthusiastic consumption of a fiery spirit that has been made on the island for hundreds of years.