A nine-year-old girl who is set to become the youngest professional player of the board game go in Japan has played the world's top-ranked female player. (NHK)

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Tuesday dashed Japanese hopes of a settlement any time soon to a territorial dispute that has festered since 1945, declaring after a meeting with the visiting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan that there was still much “painstaking work” ahead. (nytimes.com)

7-Eleven Japan has announced that it is planning to phase out sales of porno mags at its roughly 20,000 locations across Japan. (soranews24.com)

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday to seek progress on a decadeslong territorial dispute over a group of islands that have remained under Russian control since the end of World War II. (Japan Times)

A minibus decorated with All Nippon Airways Co.’s signature blue and white logo motors across the tarmac at Tokyo’s Haneda airport. From the outside, it looks like an ordinary bus, with a person sitting in the driver’s seat — except no one is really operating the vehicle. (Japan Times)

Kei Komuro, whose engagement to Japan's Princess Mako is planned, says he understands that all of his mother's financial problems have been resolved. (NHK)

The mystery over the recently discovered use of real human bones as skeleton models at schools has continued to deepen. (Japan Times)

Two Japanese films have been nominated for this year's Academy Awards. (NHK)

A man was fatally shot Monday in a karaoke bar in Tokyo’s famous Kabukicho entertainment district, police said. (Japan Times)

The leaders of Japan and Russia hold crunch summit talks on Tuesday, with the two countries locked in an undiplomatic war of words over a set of disputed islands. (Japan Today)

A 59-year-old amateur hunter died after being attacked by a wild boar Sunday morning on a mountain west of Tokyo, police said. (Kyodo)

This year's unified college and university entrance exams in Japan have ended for almost all applicants . (NHK)

A 113-year-old Japanese man died on Sunday. Masazo Nonaka was recognized by Guinness World Records as the world's oldest man in April last year. (NHK)

Police in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture, have arrested an 80-year-old man on suspicion of murder after he threw oil on his 79-year-old wife and set fire to her inside a car. (Japan Today)

More than half a million high-school students and graduates across Japan are putting their knowledge to the test at unified college and university entrance exams. (NHK)

A public high school in Machida City has apologized to a boy after the emergence online of a video that purportedly shows a male teacher assaulting him, reports Fuji News Network (tokyoreporter.com)

Tickets for all of host-nation Japan's Rugby World Cup 2019 pool games have sold out following the start of sales on a first-come, first-serve basis, organizers said Saturday. (Japan Today)

The Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP-11), a trade pact among 11 Pacific Rim nations, officially opened its doors to new members on Saturday in a move aimed at bolstering free trade at a time when the U.S. and China remain locked in a trade war. (Nikkei)

Work began in northeastern Japan on Saturday to tear down a former town hall building where dozens of people died in a tsunami in 2011, despite calls from some residents to preserve it as a memorial. (Japan Today)

Japan's Epsilon-4 rocket has put into orbit seven small satellites that were developed by private-sector companies and universities. (NHK)

Overseas dependents of foreigners working in Japan would no longer be covered by medical insurance come 2020 under a legislative proposal that seeks to restrain ballooning health care costs. (Nikkei)

Consumer prices rose a sluggish 0.9 percent last year, according to government data published Friday, as the world’s third-largest economy continues its yearslong battle to stoke weak inflation. (Japan Times)

The body of a man struck by an oncoming train at a station in Fujimi City hit and injured two women on the platform, police said on Friday, reports TV Asahi. (tokyoreporter.com)

The number of suicides in Japan dropped 3.4 percent from a year earlier to 20,598 in 2018, down for the ninth year and the lowest in 37 years amid economic recovery, preliminary data by the National Police Agency showed Friday. (Japan Today)

About 30 percent of respondents in a Japanese government survey say they want to work until their early 60s. (NHK)