June 27, 2017
The government is considering equipping cutting-edge F-35 stealth fighters with air-to-surface missiles, which are capable of striking remote targets on land, and plans to deploy these fighters to the...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Senior officials of political parties took to the streets on Sunday to seek voter support a week ahead of the closely watched Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly election on July 2.
T...
The primary focus of considering the introduction of stealth fighter jets equipped with air-to-surface missiles is to strengthen the protection of remote islands.
On the other hand, a government sour...
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s recent announcement regarding constitutional revision was aimed to secure sufficient time for Diet deliberations and discussions between the ruling and opposition parties...
SEOUL (Reuters) — South Korea marked the anniversary of the start of the 1950-53 Korean War on Sunday with a call for the North to halt development of its missiles and nuclear programs. “The Nor...
KOBE (Jiji Press) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Saturday expressed his willingness to allow the launch of more university faculties of veterinary medicine, on top of one planned by the Kake Educat...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Former vice education minister Kihei Maekawa said Friday that he believes what is written in the recently found document purportedly showing a summary of remarks by Deputy Chief...
KOBE (Jiji Press) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe showed his hope on Saturday that his ruling Liberal Democratic Party will submit its proposal for constitutional amendments to relevant panels of the D...
SEOUL — The South Korean Foreign Ministry will establish a working group as early as the end of this month to review the 2015 deal reached by the Japanese and South Korean governments over the comfo...
BRUSSELS (Jiji Press) — About 56,000 chemical weapons abandoned by the defunct Japanese military during and after World War II have been found at over 90 locations in China, and about 46,000 of the...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The government is considering using public housing to accept released prisoners as a measure to support their resettlement and prevent them reoffending, informed sources said T...
The government will include free education in the basic plan for the “revolution in human resources development” — a new initiative by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe — that it aims to compile as ea...
The chair of the Liberal Democratic Party’s Headquarters for the Promotion of Revision to the Constitution wants the Diet to initiate constitutional amendments in about June next year, which is aro...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The official campaign period for the July 2 Tokyo metropolitan assembly election began on Friday, a key test for Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike seeking to oust the Liberal Democratic P...
IWAKUNI, Yamaguchi (Jiji Press) — Yoshihiko Fukuda, mayor of the city of Iwakuni, said Friday he will accept a plan to move aircraft attached to the USS Ronald Reagan from Atsugi to Iwakuni. The d...
The Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly election will likely influence Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s future handling of the government and indicate whether his Cabinet’s strength will ebb or flow. Given hi...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz has entered the western Pacific Ocean, where another flattop, the USS Ronald Reagan of the Navy’s 7th Fleet, has already been ...
SEOUL (AFP-Jiji) — North Korea has tested a rocket engine that could be fitted to an intercontinental ballistic missile, a U.S. official said, in an apparent provocation ahead of a summit between P...
Costa Rica is aiming to reach a free trade agreement and an investment pact with Japan as part of the Central American country’s strategy to diversify its economy based on business-friendly but envi...
PARIS (AFP-Jiji) — French President Emmanuel Macron appointed little-known railway executive Florence Parly as his defense minister Wednesday as he reshuffled his Cabinet just five weeks into office...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party showed mixed responses on Wednesday to a proposal by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to revise the Constitution to stipulate the existe...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and his South Korean counterpart, Kang Kyung Wha, on Wednesday confirmed the importance of increasing pressure on North Korea to stop its nuclear...
WASHINGTON (Jiji Press) — South Korean President Moon Jae In, in a newspaper interview published online Tuesday, urged Japan to take legal responsibility and offer an official apology for former co...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Tuesday showed a plan to set up a base of the Japan International Cooperation Agency in the Guinean capital of Conakry. He informed visiting Guin...
Richard Haass, president of the New York-based think-tank Council on Foreign Relations, said Japan needs to hold discussions regarding whether the nation should have its own capability to strike enem...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — A document purportedly showing a summary of remarks by Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Koichi Hagiuda related to a contentious university faculty plan allegedly influenced by Pr...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday revealed plans to set up a new ministerial post and an expert panel for promoting investment in human resources development under the govern...
The approval rating for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet stood at 49 percent, down 12 points from the previous survey’s 61 percent, according to a Yomiuri Shimbun survey conducted Saturday to ...
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed his regret Monday for not sufficiently addressing the latest allegations surrounding a national strategic special zone in which an educational institution was to e...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — A planned visit by air to two of the four Russian-held islands at the center of a bilateral territorial issue by former Japanese islanders has been canceled, the Japanese gover...
The government and ruling parties are feeling a greater sense of urgency after the approval rating for the Cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declined in the latest Yomiuri Shimbun survey.
The fal...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — A planned visit by air to the northern territories off Hokkaido by former Japanese islanders has been put off to Monday, the government said Sunday. The Foreign Ministry cited...
The government is making arrangements for a trilateral meeting of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, U.S. President Donald Trump and South Korean President Moon Jae In on the sideline of a Group of 20 summit ...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — A senior Foreign Ministry official has urged Pyongyang to refrain from further provocative actions related to its nuclear and missile programs, the ministry said Friday. Shige...
TOKYO (AP) — Seven navy sailors were missing, and the captain and at least two others were injured, after a U.S. destroyer and a container ship collided off the coast of Japan before dawn Saturday, ...
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe intends to reshuffle his Cabinet and the Liberal Democratic Party leadership as early as late August, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned.
The regular Diet session essentially e...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The House of Councillors enacted a bill to revise the Penal Code to toughen penalties for sex crimes on Friday. The revision, which marks the first drastic review of sex crime...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — An investigation has found 27 cases in which high-ranking bureaucrats secured cushy jobs after retirement, apparently violating Japan’s national public service law, Kozo Yama...
Thursday’s passage of a bill that criminalizes preparations for terrorist attacks marks a major step forward in efforts to prevent terrorist attacks in Japan, but actually applying the revised law w...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday denied that he had exercised influence to allow the Kake Educational Institution, headed by a personal friend of his, to launch a university...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — A special law allowing the abdication of the Emperor was promulgated on Friday. The legislation, enacted on June 9, stipulates that it will take effect within three years of i...
With Thursday’s Diet passage of a bill to revise the Law on Punishment of Organized Crimes and Control of Crime Proceeds, the stage is now set for Japan to conclude the U.N. Convention against Tran...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The Diet enacted controversial anti-terrorism legislation on Thursday after the ruling coalition overcame fierce overnight resistance from most opposition parties and railroaded...
ALEXANDRIA, Va. (Reuters) — Congressman Steve Scalise, the No. 3 Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives, was in critical condition on Wednesday night after he and three others were shot as...
Lawmakers are expected to submit a bill to the Diet promoting the establishment of a facility to preserve internationally renowned Japanese manga and anime materials, and develop human resources work...
The atmosphere was tense in the assembly hall of the House of Councillors on Thursday morning as anti-terrorism legislation was enacted after all-night deliberations, drawing a mixture of applause and...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The Diet on Wednesday enacted bills to strengthen family courts’ engagement in child abuse cases to better deal with an increasing number of such acts in the country. The bi...
TOKYO (Jiji Press) — The ruling Liberal Democratic Party notified the main opposition Democratic Party on Wednesday that it plans to hold a vote on an antiterrorism bill at a House of Councillors p...
Thursday marks the 25th anniversary of the enactment of the U.N. Peacekeeping Activities Cooperation Law. Based on this law, Japan has engaged in 27 international peace cooperation operations, among ...
BOLOGNA, Italy (Jiji Press) — A U.N. human rights expert on Monday expressed concern over the Japanese government’s possible pressure on media organizations.
“I am especially concerned by the...
SEOUL — South Korean President Moon Jae In said “time is needed” to resolve issues addressed in the 2015 Japan-South Korea deal over former comfort women during a meeting with Toshihiro Nikai, t...
SEOUL — In his visit to South Korea, Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Toshihiro Nikai met key politicians of the country with the aim of laying the groundwork for the improvement of the b...
Seventy percent of Japanese respondents said the relationship between Japan and South Korea will not change, while 56 percent of South Korean respondents predicted the relationship will improve, in a...
SUFFOLK, Va. — “An armed group has come ashore on one of the Senkaku Islands in Okinawa Prefecture, and while the Japan Coast Guard and police forces struggle to bring the incident under control, ...
YOKOSUKA, Kanagawa (Jiji Press) — A Japanese destroyer joined a U.S. military supply ship in waters off the Boso Peninsula on Monday afternoon to guard it in the first such operation during peacetim...
BRUSSELS/WASHINGTON — Three North Korean banks subject to U.N. sanctions have been banned by the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication from using the society’s network, thr...
One of the four ballistic missiles simultaneously fired by North Korea on Monday landed in the Sea of Japan about 200 kilometers north of the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture, Defense Minister To...
BONN (Jiji Press) — Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi agreed Friday to urge North Korea to abide by a series of U.N. Security Council resolutions against its nucle...
BONN — The foreign ministers of Japan, the United States and South Korea condemned in a joint statement on Thursday “in the strongest terms” North Korea’s test-launch of a ballistic missile Su...
The government has issued strong protests against North Korea’s ballistic missile launch, and begun working with other countries to help bring about resolute action by the U.N. Security Council.
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North Korea’s latest ballistic missile launch seems to indicate the country’s clear hostility toward Japan and the United States after the two nations recently reconfirmed their desire for Pyongy...
By Madhuchanda Ghosh India and Japan are redefining their relations in the backdrop of the changing security architecture in Asia. The post Cold War structural changes in Asia's security environm...
