Sources say Japanese Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae is arranging to meet senior officials of the ruling coalition parties as early as Wednesday. She is likely to convey her plan to call a snap general election. Takaichi is expected to tell officials of her Liberal Democratic Party and its partner, Japan Innovation Party, that she plans to dissolve the Lower House at the start of the Diet’s regular session.
An annual winter event of lighting up traditional thatched-roof houses has begun at a UNESCO World Heritage site in central Japan. This year’s illumination started on Monday in Gifu Prefecture’s Shirakawa Village, a popular tourist destination with rustic Gassho-style houses.
The head of Japan’s biggest business lobby has voiced strong regret over China’s decision to step up controls on exports of goods to Japan for both military and civilian use. Tsutsui Yoshinobu, chair of the Japan Business Federation, or Keidanren, said China is only targeting Japan with the export restrictions on dual-use goods, and called them “an obvious act of economic coercion.”