月: 2024年3月

1. Japan plans to ease the country’s strict defense export rules to allow the sale of next generation fighter jets developed with Britain and Italy. The country’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, Komeito, came to an agreement on Friday to tweak the rules under some conditions.
2. Japan’s largest steelmaker has pushed back against President Joe Biden’s concerns over its plan to acquire US Steel. Biden said on Thursday it is “vital” that the company remains American. Officials at Nippon Steel responded on Friday, saying the deal will deliver “clear benefits” to US Steel, its workers and national security.
3. The Los Angeles Dodgers have released a photo on the team’s official social media account showing Japanese star player Ohtani Shohei’s wife for the first time. The couple are posing in front of a plane heading to South Korea, where the team’s season opener will take place.

1. Bank of Japan Governor Ueda Kazuo says the outcome of spring wage negotiations is pivotal to central bank discussions about a change in its ultra-easy monetary policy. Ueda said, “We will consider revising our negative rate policy and the Yield Curve Control framework once the 2-percent inflation target is clearly in sight and sustained.
2. An Osprey transport aircraft has resume flights at a US base in Japan’s southern prefecture of Okinawa for the first time since they were grounded after a deadly crash last November. Japan’s Defense Ministry announced on Wednesday that the aircraft would resume flights in Japan in phases from Thursday, after maintenance and crew training are completed.
3. Japan’s ruling coalition parties are expected to reach a broad agreement on a framework that would allow the export of next-generation fighter jets co-developed with Britain and Italy. The main governing Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner, Komeito, have been discussing setting strict conditions on exports.

1. This year’s US presidential election will likely be a rematch between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, now that both men have clinched their respective party’s nominations.
2. Japanese venture capital firm Space One’s Kairos rocket has exploded several seconds after liftoff from a launch site in western Japan. Space One says it aborted the flight. The small satellite-carrying solid-fuel rocket apparently developed a problem.
3. The director of “Godzilla Minus One,” Yamazaki Takashi, has returned to Japan with the Academy Award for best visual effects in tow. The movie is the first Asian production to win the Oscar in the category, and Yamazaki says the honor could be a watershed moment for Japan’s film industry.

1. Two students have graduated from a school in a town on the Noto Peninsula that was heavily affected by the powerful New Year’s Day earthquake. Many people attended Tuesday’s graduation ceremony at the integrated elementary and junior high school in Ohtani Town, in the city of Suzu, Ishikawa Prefecture.
2. A government survey shows business sentiment among major Japanese companies turned negative for the first three months of this year, the first pessimistic reading in four quarters. The gloomy view was mainly attributed to shipment suspensions at automakers due to safety test violations.
3. The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency is due to inspect the disabled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Wednesday during is visit to Japan. Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi is making a three-day trip to the country at the invitation of the Japanese Foreign Ministry. He is expected to meet with Chief Cabinet Secretary Hayashi Yoshimasa on Tuesday, the first day of the visit.

1. Thirteen years have passed since the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, tsunami and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident. Repairs of damaged of infrastructure in the disaster area are nearly complete. But the human costs continue to mount as population outflow and a graying demographic take a toll on the region.
2. Japanese animation master Miyazaki Hayao’s “The Boy and the Heron” has won the 2024 Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film. It is the second time Miyazaki has taken the prize in the category. “The Boy and the Heron” is a fantasy film about a boy who moves to the countryside after his mother’s death during World War Two, and wanders into a mysterious world guided by a talking grey heron.
3. The Japanese movie “Godzilla Minus One” has won the 2024 Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. This is the first time a Japanese movie has won an Oscar in the category. In the latest work, the giant monster unleashes chaos in post-war Japan. Godzilla appears without warning and relentlessly destroys the city that is in the process of rebuilding. The monster and the people fighting it are depicted using VFX technology.

1. Japanese manga artist Toriyama Akira, known globally for such works as “Dragon Ball” and “Dr. Slump,” has died at the age of 68. The official website of the Weekly Shonen Jump magazine said Toriyama died of acute subdural hematoma on March 1.
2. US President Joe Biden delivered the last State of the Union address of his first-term on Thursday. Speaking before a joint session of Congress, Biden kicked off his speech with a declaration on democracy, noting that “not since President Lincoln and the Civil War have freedom and democracy been under assault here at home as they are today.”
3. Japan and India have agreed to strengthen cooperation over wide areas, including national security, economic issues and cultural exchanges. Japan’s Foreign Minister Kamikawa Yoko and India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar agreed to step up cooperation to realize a free and open Indo-Pacific region, a concept advocated by Tokyo.

1. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is deepening as the Israel-Hamas conflict enters its 6th month, and pessimism is growing over the characters of an imminent pause in fighting in the enclave.
2. Policy chiefs of Japan’s ruling coalition parties are to meet on Friday to discuss the controversial issue of whether to allow exports of next-generation fighter jets.
3. Residents of the southwestern Japanese prefecture of Oita have been involved in a legal dispute to suspend a nuclear power plant’s operation. But a court has turned their demand down.

1. Nikki Haley has decided to drop out of the Republican presidential nomination race, according to multiple US media outlets. This leaves Donald Trump as the party’s presumptive nominee for US President.
2. A senior Chinese economic official says the government’s growth target of around 5 percent this year is achievable by combining fiscal and monetary policies.
3. Tokyo’s benchmark stock index edged down on Wednesday for the second-straight session, ending just shy of its all-time high.

1. Fifteen US states will soon hold primaries and caucuses on “Super Tuesday” in the Republican nomination race for the US presidential election in November. Former President Donald Trump is the frontrunner in the battle to be the Republican presidential candidate.
2. Uber Eats says it will start delivering food using self-driving robots in parts of Tokyo on Wednesday. The company expects the service will help to ease a staff shortage. A small six-wheeled robot will be introduced to two restaurants in the capital’s Nihonbashi district.
3. Ukraine’s defense ministry says it carried out a drone attack that damaged a Russian naval ship off the southern coast of Russian-occupied Crimea.

1. US Vice President Kamala Harris has called on Israel to do more to significantly increase the flow of aid into Gaza. This comes amid uncertainty over talks between Israel and Hamas on a pause in fighting and the release of hostages. Harris described the situation in Gaza as a “humanitarian catastrophe” during a speech in the southern US state of Alabama on Sunday.
2. Former US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley has won the Republican primary in Washington, D.C. The victory in the US capital is her first over former President Donald Trump in the GOP nomination race for the US presidential election in November. With all votes counted, Haley garnered 62.8 percent, against 33.3 percent for Trump.
3. Authorities in Burkina Faso say about 170 people have been killed in attacks on three villages. The security situation is worsening in the western African nation with Islamic extremists posing a major threat. Since around 2015, Islamic militants in Burkina Faso have carried out repeated attacks and acts of terrorism, mainly in the country’s northern region.