Breaking News, Latest Philippines Headlines, World, Entertainment, Politics, Weather & Video News
by Kyoko HASEGAWA Agence France-Presse TOKYO, Japan (AFP) – Six young people sued the operator of Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear plant on Thursday over claims they developed thyroid cancer due to exposure to radiation after the facility’s meltdown. The plaintiffs, now aged between 17 and 27, were living in the Fukushima region when a huge earthquake on March 11, 2011 triggered a tsunami that caused the nuclear disaster. On Thursday their lawyers marched into the […]
by Etienne Balmer and Katie Forster TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Yanita Antoko has been waiting for over a year in Indonesia to join her husband in Japan. She has her papers and has closed her business selling homemade spice mixes, but remains shut out. The 30-year-old is one of more than 370,000 people left in limbo by Japan’s coronavirus border rules, which bar almost all new arrivals and are the strictest in the G7. Even […]
NUKU’ALOFA, Tonga (AFP) – The Tonga volcanic eruption unleashed explosive forces that dwarfed the power of the Hiroshima atomic bomb, NASA scientists have said, as survivors on Monday described how the devastating Pacific blast “messed up our brains”. The NASA Earth Observatory said the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano spewed debris as high as 40 kilometres (25 miles) into the atmosphere during the January 15 eruption that triggered huge tsunami waves. “We think the amount of […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will discuss deterrence in the Asia-Pacific region and a “united” Western alliance against Russian threats to Ukraine in a virtual meeting Friday, officials said. Biden has made restoring the importance of the US-Japanese relationship a priority since taking office exactly a year ago, following Donald Trump’s questioning of the benefit of US relationships with several major allies in both Asia […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japan’s government approved new coronavirus restrictions on a large part of the country, including Tokyo, on Wednesday as it battles record infections fuelled by the Omicron variant. The restrictions in 13 regions, which mainly target nightlife and are far less strict than a blanket lockdown, will be in place from Friday until mid-February. The move allows each region to decide what specific measures to implement, with most places urging bars and […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) – The world’s top-selling carmaker Toyota said Tuesday it no longer expects to meet its annual production target with operations hampered by the global chip crunch. A worldwide shortage of microchips — essential components of modern cars — has forced many automakers including Toyota to slow or temporarily halt production. In September, the Japanese giant lowered the number of vehicles it hopes to make in the year to March 2022 to nine […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will meet virtually Friday to discuss bilateral ties as well as security in the Pacific region, the White House said. On the agenda will be fighting Covid-19 and climate change and exploring new technologies, according to a statement Sunday from the White House. “The meeting will highlight the strength of the US-Japan Alliance, which is the cornerstone of peace, security, […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Two-time Olympic gymnastics all-around champion Kohei Uchimura has retired aged 33, his management said Tuesday, ending the career of one of the sport’s all-time greats. Uchimura claimed gold at the 2012 and 2016 Games, won the Olympic team title with Japan in Rio and was crowned all-around world champion six times. But he suffered disappointment in his Olympic swansong, falling off the horizontal bar and failing to reach the final at […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japan will extend measures barring almost all new foreign arrivals until the end of February and reopen mass-vaccination centres as it battles an Omicron-fuelled coronavirus surge, the government said Tuesday. “We will keep the current border control policy until the end of February while taking necessary measures from a humanitarian viewpoint and considering the national interest,” Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters. Local media said there would be some new […]
by Tomohiro OSAKI TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa said Friday his trip into space had given him a new appreciation for Earth, and he now hopes to plunge into the ocean’s forbidding Mariana Trench. Maezawa and his assistant Yozo Hirano spent 12 days on the International Space Station last month, where they documented life in space for one million YouTube subscribers. Speaking Friday for the first time since his return to […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Japan moved ahead with an expansion of support to US troops as the allies held top-level talks on tensions with China and North Korea. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the two nations were signing a five-year extension of the support package provided by Japan for the hosting of nearly 50,000 US troops on its soil. The new agreement “will invest greater resources to deepen our military readiness […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) – Japan’s Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi urged his US counterpart Thursday to consider restricting American troop movement in the country after a surge in Covid cases on bases and surrounding communities. The request to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken comes as virus cases surge in Okinawa, which hosts most of the US forces in Japan and is now seeing a rise in community infections. The region’s governor has blamed the rise […]
