Japan

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Japan's Crime Gangs Went Where, Exactly?

Police say yakuza membership is declining due to stricter laws

(Newser) - Japan's underworld crime syndicates, or yakuza, have apparently dwindled over the years, raising the question of where they've gone and why they dropped out of sight, the Daily Beast reports. Police say stricter laws have pressured yakuza members out of the business, by empowering financial institutions to punish...

Japan's 'Beethoven': I'm Still Kinda Deaf

Samuragochi says he'll never appear on TV again

(Newser) - Mamoru Samuragochi, the acclaimed deaf Japanese composer who was outed by his ghostwriter as neither deaf nor a composer , held a contrite press conference today that he promised would be his last. "I will speak the truth. I will make this my last appearance on TV," the 50-year-old...

Report: Feds Subpoena Mt. Gox

Japan also promises to investigate

(Newser) - Federal prosecutors in New York have sent a subpoena to Mt. Gox, the once-mighty bitcoin exchange that vanished yesterday , the Wall Street Journal reports. Prosecutors demanded that the site preserve certain documents, a source said. Mt. Gox is based out of Tokyo, but if its employees sent emails or financial...

The Wind Rises Is a Beautiful, Difficult Finale for Miyazaki

Film is typically lyrical, atypically realistic, and a little controversial

(Newser) - What might be Hayao Miyazaki's last film makes its US debut this weekend, and naturally critics are in love with it. The beloved filmmaker announced his retirement after The Wind Rises debuted at the Venice Film Festival last year. Since then the movie—a biopic of Jiro Horikoshi, who...

Japan Mystery: Anne Frank's Diary Torn Apart

'We don't know why this happened or who did it,' says library council head

(Newser) - More than 100 copies of Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl, plus many other related works that make mention of her or the Holocaust, have been ripped apart recently in Tokyo—the capital of a country where sales of the diary are second only to those in...

Fukushima Springs Big New Toxic Leak

100 tons of radioactive water flow from tank

(Newser) - Almost three years after Japan's triple disaster, there has been yet another leak at the Fukushima nuclear plant, seriously shaking public confidence in the ongoing cleanup and containment effort. In the latest leak—the biggest since last August —around 100 metric tons of highly contaminated water overflowed from...

After Amazing Rescue, Diver Found Dead

Earlier stories point to 2 divers found alive

(Newser) - Five Japanese scuba divers who'd been missing for days turned up yesterday ; reports later in the day fueled hope for the two still missing, with local police saying fishermen had found the two on a cliff some 16 feet over the water but couldn't reach them in the...

5 Scuba Divers Alive After 3 Days at Sea

2 Japanese divers still missing

(Newser) - Rescuers in Indonesia continue to search for two Japanese scuba divers missing since Friday, buoyed by the remarkable rescue of the other five members of the diving group today. Fishing boats spotted the five women clinging to a coral reef off the coast of Bali, reports AFP . They had drifted...

Bizarre Tsunami Ghost Stories Haunt Japan

But is the country's cult of ancestors behind it all?

(Newser) - An unusual outbreak has struck Japan in the wake of the 2011 tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people—of ghosts, possessions, and exorcisms. Reverend Kaneda, the top priest at a Zen temple, says he personally exorcised several people who had been invaded by the spirits of tsunami victims, writes...

Burger King Experiments With Apples in Burgers

Tomato-less burgers seem to be going over well in Japan

(Newser) - USA Today picks up on an odd food story out of Japan, where the burgers at Burger King tend to taste like apple pie. The reason? The new BK Ringo and the NY Whopper ditch tomatoes for slices of grilled apple. It also helps that the mayo is infused...

Rare Snowstorm Kills 11 in Japan

Tokyo sees heaviest snowfall in 45 years

(Newser) - The heaviest snowfall in decades is causing chaos in Tokyo and elsewhere in Japan, with at least 11 people dead and around 1,000 injured in snow-related accidents. The capital has been blanketed with at least 11 inches of snow, the most it has seen in 45 years and enough...

Tokyo Women Vow Sex Strike Over Candidate

Gubernatorial hopeful once said women weren't fit to hold office

(Newser) - Tokyo elects a new governor this weekend, and one of the frontrunners is Yoichi Masuzoe, a former health minister backed by the establishment. The 65-year-old has 15 challengers to fend off and now a new group that calls itself "the association of women who will not have sex with...

Things Getting Frosty With Japan ... Over WWII

Japan broadcasting official: US made up 'Rape of Nanking'

(Newser) - Remember the "Rape of Nanking," which saw Japanese troops kill up to 300,000 Chinese soldiers and civilians, according to Chinese numbers, in 1937? Well the word from Naoki Hyakuta—newly-appointed to the board of governors of Japan's state broadcaster, known as NHK, and a personal friend...

'Japan's Beethoven' Admits 18-Year Fraud

Mamoru Samuragochi lost hearing at age 35

(Newser) - The success of 50-year-old composer Mamoru Samuragochi, who is deaf, has prompted the nickname "Japan's Beethoven." Trouble is, it turns out he hasn't written his own music in decades. "I started hiring (a) person to compose music for me around 1996, when I was asked...

Va. Governor in Deep Trouble Over ... Sea of Japan?

Textbook change sparks international incident

(Newser) - More than 100 people crammed the hallways outside a small subcommittee meeting room in Virginia's legislature yesterday, cheering as the bill under consideration moved forward, the Daily Press reports. The bill that raised such passion sounds innocuous enough—it would require textbooks to mention that the Sea of Japan...

Japan Launches Dolphin Slaughter
Japan Finishes Dolphin Slaughter—Under Cover
UPDATED
Jan 21, 2014 7:50 AM CST

Japan Finishes Dolphin Slaughter—Under Cover

Dozens slaughtered for meat amid protests

(Newser) - Japanese fishermen have wrapped up their annual dolphin hunt and slaughter in Taiji cove amid international protests . CNN reports that some 500 bottlenose dolphins were driven into the cove—a larger number than usual, though Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is sticking with its original claim that 250 or so dolphins...

Furor Erupts as Dolphins Set for Slaughter at Japan Cove

Annual hunt at Taiji again under fire as 200+ animals await slaughter

(Newser) - More than 200 bottlenose dolphins await their deaths in Japan's Taiji cove—made infamous in 2009 documentary The Cove —and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is doing its best to draw attention and outrage to the annual slaughter. As CNN reports, Japanese fishermen herded a pod of 250...

Japanese WWII Soldier Who Hid in Jungle 29 Years Dies

For Hiroo Onoda, war ended in 1974

(Newser) - Former Japanese Imperial Army soldier Hiroo Onoda has died at the age of 91—roughly 40 years after he stopped fighting World War II. Onoda, the last Japanese soldier to surrender, hid out in the jungles of the Philippines for almost 30 years after 1945, only coming out of hiding...

Japan to Tackle Space Junk With ... Giant Net

It's magnetic, and first trial run starts next month

(Newser) - The amount of dangerous junk floating around in space is by all accounts getting out of control . Next month, Japan's space agency will try to do something about it with a novel idea: It's launching a huge magnetic net, reports the South China Morning Post . The contraption is...

Japanese Firm Buys Jim Beam for $13.6B

$13.6B deal set to be 3rd-biggest in industry history

(Newser) - Jim Beam, Maker’s Mark, and Knob Creek bourbons will soon have a second home in Japan. Beam, the owner of the whiskeys and the world’s fourth-biggest liquor company by sales, has reached a deal to be purchased by Osaka’s Suntory, a family-owned liquor company that’s No....

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