The head of the Fukui Prefectural Police in central Japan received a traffic ticket for making an illegal right turn while off duty in May, the police said Monday. (Kyodo)

Photos and videos of submerged houses and cars in torrential rain in southwestern Japan inundated social media on Saturday, with trapped people calling for help and others assuring families and friends of their safety. (Kyodo)

Major Japanese wireless carriers recently launched a service to provide foreign tourists with disaster relief information via mobile phone short message service in the event of an earthquake or typhoon. (Kyodo)

Alpine plants have come under threat of extinction from the sudden expansion of a species of dwarf bamboo in mountainous regions of Japan. (Kyodo)

The Japanese government on Friday unveiled a draft growth strategy that promotes cashless payments and diverse workstyles, responding to the needs of the post-coronavirus era. (Kyodo)

Night sky watchers say what appeared to be a fireball was seen streaking over wide areas of Japan. (NHK)

More than 3,400 elementary and junior high school students and teachers have contracted food poisoning at 15 schools near Tokyo due to school lunches, local authorities said Thursday. (Kyodo)

Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea reopened Wednesday with social-distancing measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus after closing for some four months over the pandemic. (Kyodo)

Two universities in Osaka Prefecture evacuated their campuses on Monday after a bomb threat was made criticizing the English name of their planned new merged school, the operator of the schools said. (Kyodo)

Less than a week remains until the capital’s gubernatorial election on July 5, and it appears the incumbent’s strategy — taking advantage of her popularity by running a defensive campaign — is working. (Japan Times)

Gilead Sciences Inc. said Monday that its experimental anti-coronavirus drug remdesivir will be supplied to the governments of developed countries at what it sees as an affordable price of $2,340 per patient for a typical five-day treatment course. (Kyodo)

A crane overturned and its arm smashed into a nearby residential house on Friday in western Japan, triggering a fire and injuring a 1-year-old girl who was asleep at the time, police said. (Kyodo)

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.2 struck off eastern Japan early Thursday, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. No tsunami warning was issued. (Kyodo)

The government is set to strengthen the capacity of consumer affairs centers across Japan to support game addicts and their families, sources familiar with the matter said Sunday. (Kyodo)

Summer is here at last, and Universal Studios Japan finally opened its doors again on Friday. But before you get too excited, make sure you live in or around the cities of Osaka and Kyoto. Otherwise, you won't be able to enter. (Nikkei)

A total of 39 of Japan's 47 prefectures are offering or plan to offer customers discounts for staying at their hotels and inns to help spur demand that has fallen due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, a Kyodo News survey found Friday. (Japan Today)

Japanese casual clothing chain Uniqlo unveiled to the press on Thursday its new flagship store in Tokyo's upscale Ginza shopping district ahead of its grand opening the following day. (Kyodo)

A Japanese university team has succeeded in the first-ever mass proliferation of rainbow trout germline stem cells, or GSCs, in vitro, a technique that could pave the way for preservation of endangered fish and enable their mass production. (Kyodo)

Kenki Fukuoka, who starred for Japan at last autumn's Rugby World Cup, said Sunday he won't compete in next year's postponed Tokyo Olympics in order to stay on course for a future in medicine. (Kyodo)

Operators of nightlife establishments will have to keep a record of their customers' names and contact information and ensure social distancing rules as part of measures to contain the spread of the coronavirus, according to guidelines released by the government on Saturday. (Kyodo)

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.3 rattled southwestern Japan on early Sunday but no tsunami warning was issued, the weather agency said. (Kyodo)

When 21-year-old Cuban outfielder Oscar Colas turned up in the Dominican Republic in January, he hoped to leave both his homeland and Japan's SoftBank Hawks behind him as a new baseball future in America beckoned. (Kyodo)

A 94-year-old amusement park Toshimaen in Tokyo will be closed at the end of August, its owner said Friday, and part of the site will be used for a new theme park based on the Harry Potter films, due to open in the first half of 2023. (Kyodo)

Chubu airport in central Japan will resume some international flights from next Tuesday after operations were suspended for more than two months due to the spread of the novel coronavirus, the operator said Thursday. (Kyodo)

The Japan High School Baseball Federation said Wednesday they will hold a series of games at Koshien Stadium in August between teams that had been selected for the cancelled spring invitational high school baseball championship. (Kyodo)