Tao Okamoto and French actress Virginie Efira won the Best Actress award at the Cannes International Film Festival, for their performances in Ryusuke Hamaguchi's film 'Suddenly, I Feel Sick', marking the first time a Japanese actress has received the honor.

Popular voice actor Kenjiro Tsuda has filed a lawsuit with the Tokyo District Court seeking the removal of videos that allegedly used generative AI to imitate his voice without permission on the video-sharing app TikTok.

Construction projects across Japan are being suspended as shortages of paint, thinner and waterproofing materials linked to worsening tensions in the Middle East place mounting pressure on small and midsize builders, with some contractors warning they may soon be forced out of business.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi met with Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda at the Prime Minister’s Office on May 22nd, urging the central bank to implement appropriate monetary policies while taking into account the government’s efforts to combat rising prices and promote crisis-management and growth-related investment.

A new Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers’ group aimed at advancing the policies of the Takaichi administration held its first meeting, with Vice President Aso appointed as supreme adviser and former Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato named chairman.

Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party is moving toward legislation that would punish acts of damaging or defiling the national flag in public, with a party project team broadly approving the outline of a proposed law on May 22nd while excluding decorative flags used in children's meals, artwork and digital content.

Education Minister Yohei Matsumoto said on May 22nd that Doshisha International High School's planning, on-site response and safety management during a study trip to Okinawa were "grossly inappropriate," placing extremely heavy responsibility on the school and its operator after two small boats carrying students capsized off Henoko in Nago, killing a student and a captain.

Japan's next-generation homegrown supercomputer, Fugaku NEXT, is being developed with a radically different strategy from its predecessors, abandoning the single-minded pursuit of the world's fastest calculation speed in favor of artificial intelligence capabilities expected to accelerate breakthroughs in fields ranging from drug development and batteries to disaster prevention and food production.

Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry is considering the use of AI to produce low-cost localized versions of Japanese content for overseas markets in an effort to secure legitimate revenue streams, as the total estimated damage caused by online piracy of anime, character goods and other content exceeded 10 trillion yen for the first time last year.

The Nikkei Stock Average climbed sharply again on May 22nd, closing at a record high of 63,339 as investor sentiment improved on expectations that fighting between the United States and Iran could soon come to an end.

Takako Matsu made an elegant first appearance on the Cannes Film Festival red carpet as Koji Fukada’s latest film, 'Nagi Notes,' premiered in the festival’s main competition section, with the actress appearing alongside co-star Shizuka Ishibashi before an international crowd of photographers and film fans gathered outside the Palais des Festivals.

The film 'Kokuhou,' which swept 10 categories at this year's Japan Academy Film Prize ceremony in March, has become one of Japan's biggest box office successes in decades, helping fuel record profits at major distributor and production company Toho.

A black bear was filmed walking directly toward a camera from only a few meters away at around 2 p.m. on May 21st in the parking lot of a tourist facility in Susono, Shizuoka Prefecture, as the person recording the scene could be heard saying, "Call someone. Wait a minute. This is bad, it is coming this way. We could get hurt."

The season's first auction for Yubari melons, a signature specialty of Yubari in Hokkaido, was held at the Sapporo Central Wholesale Market on Friday morning, with a pair of the premium melons fetching a record 5.8 million yen.

Japan is among the countries expanding AI translation systems most rapidly. This technology appears in train stations, airports, hotels, shops, and tourist areas across the country.

Bear sightings across Japan have already climbed to nearly twice the level recorded during the same period last year, prompting entry bans in mountain areas behind Kyoto’s Ninna-ji Temple and the cancellation of hiking events in Kansai, while new research suggests that the key to reducing encounters may lie in understanding what bears eat in each region.

After days of near-summer heat through May 20th, rain believed to mark the start of Japan's rainy season front swept across the country on May 21st, bringing sharp temperature drops, strong winds, and warnings for potentially heavy downpours.

Six people, including a senior member of a group affiliated with the Sumiyoshi-kai crime syndicate's Kohei-ikka faction, have been arrested on suspicion of opening a gang office in a prohibited area near a nursery school in Tokyo's Itabashi Ward.

Honda will launch a new compact electric vehicle in Japan as it seeks to expand EV sales and rebuild its four-wheel business following its first annual loss since listing.

An advanced artificial intelligence model developed by U.S.-based AI startup Anthropic is raising alarm worldwide over the growing threat of AI-powered cyberattacks, with experts warning that financial systems and critical infrastructure could become targets if the technology falls into the wrong hands.

A safety alert is expected to be issued as early as May 21st over Tavneos, a drug used to treat vasculitis, after 20 patients who took the medication died from serious liver dysfunction, according to people familiar with the matter.

Japan's Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has released an assessment of passive exposure to heated tobacco products, saying that while harmful substances in the air increase when such products are used indoors, the link with cancer risk cannot be determined at this stage.

Japan’s imports of crude oil from the Middle East plunged 67.2% in April from a year earlier, as the impact of the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz began to ripple through the country’s trade and energy supply chains.

The impact of tensions in the Middle East is spreading to familiar snacks in Japan, with Morinaga & Co. temporarily suspending sales of some caramel products, including its long-selling Hi-Soft brand, after difficulties emerged in securing certain raw materials.

The Nikkei Stock Average rebounded sharply on May 21st after falling below 60,000 at the previous day's close, briefly rising more than 2,200 points as hopes grew for progress in talks toward ending the fighting between the United States and Iran, while SoftBank Group gave the market a major boost following reports that OpenAI was preparing to file for an initial public offering.