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Tokyo, Feb. 14 (Jiji Press)--The families of missing persons believed to have been abducted by North Korea but not designated as such on the Japanese government's official list of abduction victims need broader support as their activities have been affected by aging. Activities relying solely on family members are nearing their limits, say people involved in efforts to rescue possible abduc......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--An advisory panel to Japan's health minister decided Friday to allow public health insurance coverage for a gene therapy for muscular dystrophy beginning Feb. 20 and set the drug's official price at about 304.97 million yen. Elevidys, a one-time treatment for Duchenne muscular dystrophy in ambulatory patients aged 3-7, will become the country's most expensive dr......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi expects the Bank of Japan to raise its policy interest rate in the near future, but not this spring, Etsuro Honda, an economic adviser to the Japanese leader, has said in a recent interview. "I think that an additional rate hike of 0.25 percentage point in the not-so-distant future is within the prime minister's expectation......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will hold a meeting with Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda on Monday, the government said Friday. Takaichi and Ueda are expected to exchange views on the economic and price situations, and financial market moves at a time when the yen is weakening and interest rates in Japan are rising. The meeting, scheduled to begin at......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japan's health ministry released on Friday the five-year survival rates of people newly diagnosed with cancer across the country in 2017 and 2018, showing that prostate cancer patients had the highest rates among those aged 15 or over. The survival rate for prostate cancer patients diagnosed in 2017 came to 92.2 pct, while that for 2018 stood at 92.5 pct. Mea......

Nagoya, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Toyota Motor Corp.'s labor union decided Friday to demand pay scale and regular wage increases of 8,590-21,580 yen a month in this year's "shunto" spring negotiations. The request amount differs depending on employee's job type and wage grade. If employee evaluations exceed the standard, additional hikes will be sought. The Toyota union will demand annual bon......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi instructed her ruling Liberal Democratic Party on Friday to expedite deliberations at the upcoming special session of the Diet, Japan's parliament, so the government's initial budget for fiscal 2026 can pass through the Diet before the current fiscal year ends next month. Meeting with Hiroshi Kajiyama, the LDP's Diet affairs chief, ......

Kyoto, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--A weakening of a mechanism that produces a sense of satisfaction after drinking could lead to excessive alcohol consumption, a team of Japanese and other researchers has found. The discovery by the team, including researchers from Kyoto University, was published in a U.S. scientific journal last month. The team expects the findings to help improve alcoholism ......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Bank of Japan policymaker Naoki Tamura said Friday that the central bank's 2 pct inflation target could be deemed to have been achieved as early as this spring. In a speech in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo, Tamura said that the BOJ will implement monetary policy in a "timely and appropriate manner" to ensure stable attainment of the goal, signali......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Dentsu Group Inc. said Friday that it logged a record consolidated net loss of 327.6 billion yen for the year through December 2025 due chiefly to an impairment loss of 310.1 billion yen from sluggish overseas operations. The major Japanese advertising agency's loss widened from the previous year's 192.1 billion yen. Its operating loss totaled 289.2 billion yen, ......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Nearly 60 pct of companies in Japan do not want the Bank of Japan to raise interest rates over the next year, a poll by Tokyo Shoko Research Ltd. showed Friday. The results indicated that many companies are concerned that higher borrowing costs will increase pressure on their finances. In the survey on monetary policy over the next year, 59.6 pct of companies......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party plans to recommend former Justice Minister Eisuke Mori as speaker of the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the Diet, the country's parliament, senior LDP officials said Friday. Mori, a 77-year-old LDP member, is expected to be chosen as Lower House speaker on the first day Wednesday of a 150-day special Diet s......

Fukuoka, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japan has seized a Chinese fishing vessel and arrested its 47-year-old Chinese captain after the boat allegedly tried to flee an inspection in the Japanese exclusive economic zone off an island in Nagasaki Prefecture, southwestern Japan. It was the first time since 2022 for Japanese authorities to capture a Chinese vessel. According to Japan's Fisheries Age......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--An advisory panel to Japan's health minister on Friday recommended raising medical fees under the country's health insurance system to reflect rising prices and support wage increases for medical workers. According to the recommendations by the Central Social Insurance Medical Council, the fee for a follow-up hospital visit would rise by 10 yen, while the basic ......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japan's opposition Centrist Reform Alliance on Friday elected Junya Ogawa, former secretary-general of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, as its leader. In the leadership election, Ogawa, 54, gained 27 votes from the new centrist party's 49 lawmakers, surpassing 22 votes for his sole contender, Takeshi Shina, a 59-year-old former parliamentary vice mi......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Japan's SoftBank Group Corp. said Friday its smartphone payment service unit PayPay Corp. will go public on the U.S. Nasdaq stock market. PayPay filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission a statement explaining its initial public offering plan to investors. The company is expected to go public as early as March. Its market capitalization is project......

Washington, Feb. 12 (Jiji Press)--Japan and the United States have yet to work out the first batch of U.S.-bound investment deals worth 550 billion dollars planned by Tokyo, visiting Japanese economic minister Ryosei Akazawa said Thursday. After a 90-minute meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in Washington, Akazawa told a press conference that "the gap remains wide open" ove......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--The Diet, Japan's parliament, will kick off a special session on Wednesday, Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told party representatives on Friday. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is expected to be re-elected on the first day of the session following her ruling Liberal Democratic Party's landslide victory in Sunday's election for the House of Representatives, ......

Tokyo, Feb. 13 (Jiji Press)--Dentsu Group Inc. has decided to book an impairment loss of 310.1 billion yen for the year through December 2025, due to sluggish overseas operations, it was learned Friday. For the business year, the major Japanese advertising group is expected to log a record consolidated net loss, widening from the previous year's 192.1 billion yen. The company will skip divid......

Milan, Feb. 12 (Jiji Press)--Japanese snowboarder Mitsuki Ono and skier Ikuma Horishima each won a bronze medal at the Milan-Cortina Olympics on Thursday. Ono secured her bronze in the women's snowboard halfpipe, which marked Japan's record-setting fourth medal in snowboarding during a single event. Horishima claimed his medal in the men's freestyle skiing moguls, earning his second cons......