National News (2004)

May/23

Japanese teen wins best actor award at Cannes Film Festival - Yuya Yagira, a Japanese teenager, was the surprise winner of the best actor award at the 57th Cannes Film Festival on Saturday night for his performance in ''Nobody Knows.''

May/22

Koizumi brings 5 abductees' kin but criticized by abductees - Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi returned to Japan on Saturday night with five of the eight family members of the five repatriated Japanese abductees after offering food and medical aid to North Korea in a summit meeting here with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.

May/19

UFJ decides on sweeping management reshuffle - The UFJ financial group decided Wednesday to carry out a sweeping management reshuffle, including the resignation of three top managers over the banking group's failure to meet net profit goals, sources close to the move said.

May/16

Hokutoriki suffers first defeat - Top-ranked maegashira Hokutoriki (L) is sent crashing to his first defeat in a battle with sekiwake Wakanosato at the Summer Grand Sumo Tournament at Tokyo's Ryogoku Kokugikan on May 16.

May/14

Hokutoriki ends Asashoryu's winning run at summer sumo .

May/12

Ozawa hints at succeeding Kan as DPJ leader - Democratic Party of Japan No. 2 leader Ichiro Ozawa indicated Wednesday he will accept a request to assume the presidency of the largest opposition party.

May/11

Toyota becomes 1st Japan firm with over 1 tril. yen net profit

May/10

DPJ leader Kan to quit over pension scandal - Naoto Kan said Monday he will resign as leader of the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan following his failure to pay into the national pension plan, a move that was spurred by the resignation of Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda over his own failure to make such payments.

May/9

Koizumi may visit Pyongyang to pick up relatives of abductees - Japan and North Korea are considering whether Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi can visit Pyongyang to pick up the relatives of Japanese abductees, in an effort to reach a breakthrough on the abduction issue, informed sources said Saturday.

May/8

Kan may resign Monday as pension nonpayment ripple spreads - The uproar in Japan's political world over nonpayment of mandatory national pension premiums by several leading lawmakers continued Saturday, with opposition leader Naoto Kan likely to be pressured to step down as early as Monday.

May/7

Koizumi's top aide Fukuda resigns over pension issue - Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's closest aide, Yasuo Fukuda, resigned Friday as chief Cabinet secretary, saying he has caused public distrust over his and six other Cabinet members' failure to pay into the national pension plan.

May/6

7 ex-M'bishi Motors execs held over fatal truck accident - Police arrested the former vice president and six other ex-executives of Mitsubishi Motors Corp. on Thursday in connection with a fatal truck accident in Yokohama in 2002, dealing another blow to Japan's fourth-largest automaker that is seeking ways to revive its business under a new team.

May/5

Koizumi may revisit N. Korea over abduction issue - Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has decided to again visit North Korea in a bid to seek a breakthrough in the impasse over the abduction issue, if the North promises to allow the family members of five repatriated Japanese to visit Japan, Japanese government sources said Tuesday.

May/4

Man on solo trans-Pacific trip believed safe as rowboat spotted SAPPORO M - A 62-year-old Japanese man on a solo trans-Pacific trip is believed to be safe after sending out a distress call and having his single-oar boat spotted by a search plane some 1,400 kilometers east-southeast of Hokkaido on Tuesday morning, the Japan Coast Guard said.

The pilot of the Maritime Self-Defense Force search plane saw a man on the small boat who fired a pyrotechnic signal when the aircraft approached, Coast Guard officials said.

May/3

Man trying to cross Pacific with single oar seeks help - A 62-year-old Japanese man on a solo trans-Pacific trip using only a single oar to power his boat has sent a distress call after covering more than 1,000 kilometers of his trip, the Japan Coast Guard said Monday.

Ikuo Tateo sent the distress call several times from about 4:50 p.m. Sunday until early Monday morning, and the signals have been picked up by satellites, coast guard officials said.

May/2

Yabunaka to visit China for abduction talks with N. Korea - Senior Japanese diplomat Mitoji Yabunaka is likely to visit China soon for talks with North Korean officials on bilateral matters focusing on the issue of North Korea's past abductions of Japanese, diplomatic sources said Sunday.

May/1

Airports, trains packed with Golden Week vacationers - Airports, shinkansen bullet trains and highways were packed with vacationers Saturday as Japan's Golden Week holiday period shifted into high gear.

1 dead, 27 injured in sightseeing bus accident in Hokkaido HAKODATE, Japan - A bus driver died and 27 people were injured when a sightseeing bus tipped onto its side Saturday morning on a highway in the town of Oshamambe, Hokkaido, police said. They said about 25 tourists from Taiwan were on board the bus. The bus driver, Masao Mizushima, 61, died in hospital, while three people were seriously wounded. The remaining 24 suffered minor injuries, they said.

Apr/30

Japan welcomes U.S. mention of abduction in report - Japan on Friday welcomed the United States' mentioning for the first time the issue of Japanese nationals abducted in the 1970s and 1980s by North Korea in its annual report on global terrorism, which was released Thursday.

Apr/29

GSDF sentries sight 2 shells heading toward camp in Iraq - Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF) sentries saw two artillery shells head toward the troops' camp in the southern Iraqi city of Samawah early Thursday morning, prompting the troops to evacuate to bunkers for several hours, according to reports from local police and other sources.

Student turns self in over bomb threat against U.S. Embassy CHIBA, Japan - A university student from Funabashi, Chiba Prefecture, has turned himself in to police for threatening to bomb the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo in a message he posted on an Internet bulletin board, the police said Thursday.

The police said they plan to send papers on the 21-year-old student to prosecutors by as early as next week on suspicion of interfering with the duties of the U.S. Embassy.

Apr/27

Defense panel seeks flexibility to deal with new threats - Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's advisory panel on revising Japan's basic defense strategy called Tuesday for flexibility in dealing with such emerging threats as terrorism and ballistic missiles.

Apr/26

LDP sweeps 3 by-elections

The Liberal Democratic Party won three House of Representatives by-elections held in Saitama, Hiroshima and Kagoshima prefectures Sunday, defeating opposition candidates fielded by Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) and the Japanese Communist Party.

Apr / 25

Suprapartisan group visits Yasukuni Shrine
A suprapartisan group of 84 Diet members visited Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo on Thursday morning.

The annual visit by the group, which encourages lawmakers to worship at the shrine dedicated to the war dead, was held to coincide with the shrine's spring festival.

The group is headed by Tsutomu Kawara, a former director general of the Defense Agency.

Lawmakers from the Liberal Democratic Party, including former Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and Tamisuke Watanuki, a former House of Representatives speaker, and Minshuto (Democratic Party of Japan) and independent members of the Diet participated in the visit.

No Cabinet ministers were among them