A sea mine that is believed to have been one of many scattered by the U.S. military at the end of World War II was blown up off the coast of Kitakyushu on Sept. 25.

The U.S. military is believed to have laid more than 10,000 mines in ports and straits in Japan to disrupt sea lanes. Although most of them have been removed, the one blown up off…[Read more]

The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by a group of people living in Europe who have challenged Japan’s ban on its citizens also holding foreign nationality.
The decision by the Supreme Court’s First Petty Bench, dated Thursday, will let stand lower court rulings that acknowledged the constitutionality of a legal requirement that Japanese who…[Read more]

advertising campaigns.

Kitagawa was one of the Japanese entertainment industry’s most powerful figures, propelling numerous groups such as SMAP and Arashi to stardom before his death in 2019.

After a BBC documentary aired in March featuring interviews with multiple people who claimed to have been sexually abused by the pop mogul, several former…[Read more]

Mitsuru Claire Chino is managing executive officer at Itochu.

For years, many in Japan saw the country’s general trading companies, known as sogo shosha, as obsolete artifacts of a bygone era in the country’s economic development.

These days, though, the sogo shosha are trendy. American investor Warren Buffett has taken significant stakes in…[Read more]

OSAKA — Major Japanese engineering company Hitachi Zosen will start selling synthetic protein to artificial meat producers as soon as 2025, Nikkei has learned, using a process that reduces production costs by about 90%.

The artificial meat protein will be made using a method developed by NUProtein, a startup based in Tokushima city, Japan.…[Read more]

Metal theft by criminal gangs in Germany is alarming the public and businesses. The resulting disruptions will worsen as copper prices rise.

German railway operator Deutsche Bahn has been struggling for quite a while now. Decades of neglect have left the state-owned company’s infrastructure and rolling stock in tatters and its finances in…[Read more]

Rising interest rates are driving property developers in Germany into bankruptcy – and leaving would-be homeowners out in the cold.

Public transport use in Germany goes up ‘thanks to €49 ticket’
People wait for an U-Bahn train in Munich. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Sven Hoppe
The introduction of the Deutschlandticket contributed to an increase in passenger numbers on buses and trains in the first half of the year, according to Germany’s Statistical Office on Thursday.

Armenia in political crisis after Nagorno-Karabakh defeat

The opposition has demanded that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan resign for “giving Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan.”