The wife of former Nissan Motor chairman Carlos Ghosn says she left Japan for France to fight for her husband's human rights following his rearrest in Tokyo. (NHK)

Japan decided Tuesday to extend its sanctions against North Korea for two years, maintaining pressure on Pyongyang to denuclearize and resolve its past abductions of Japanese nationals. (Japan Times)

Japan will redesign its banknotes to incorporate the latest anti-forgery techniques. Finance Minister Taro Aso announced the makeover on Tuesday. The design changes will be the first since 2004. (NHK)

A man operating a turret truck died Monday after getting caught in an elevator door at Tokyo's Toyosu fish market, police said. (Japan Today)

The bridge connecting Kansai International Airport, on an artificial island in Osaka Bay, with the mainland, was fully reopened Monday with all six inbound and outbound lanes functional following months of repairs after it was hit by a tanker ship during a typhoon in September 2018. (Japan Today)

In Japan, there is no food more beloved than ramen, and there's no town more ramen crazy than Kyoto's Ichijoji neighborhood. It's considered the most competitive ramen area in the country, a place where famous national chains are born -- and hopes and dreams soar and crumble in the ramen industry. Ichijoji is well known in Japan but virtually unknown outside the country so -- WELCOME to KYOTO! (ONLY in JAPAN)

Only about 25 percent of universities in Japan have imposed blanket bans on smoking on all campuses, months before tighter regulations come into force, according to a recent survey. (Japan Times)

Security cameras have been installed on street lights along Tokyo’s high-end shopping boulevard, Omotesando-dori, situated in Shibuya Ward, due to an increase in pick-pocketing and camera voyeurism. (Japan Today)

A recent survey in Japan has uncovered an alarming number of middle-aged people without work and who rarely leave home. (Nikkei)

Seven-Eleven Japan will get a new leader as it struggles to find workers for its round-the-clock business. The new chief says he will be flexible in responding to the needs of individual outlets. (NHK)

For the third time, baseball star Ichiro Suzuki has turned down a prestigious Japanese government award handed to stars in sports, entertainment, and culture. (Japan Today)

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency says it's highly likely that probe Hayabusa2 has succeeded in the world's first mission of creating a crater on an asteroid to study its interior. (NHK)

A 27-year-old Australian man was arrested in Tokyo yesterday, in relation to an incident that occurred in 2018 when a subway train at a rail yard in the city’s Bunkyo Ward was found covered in graffiti. (soranews24.com)

Japan's Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko have met with Panama's President Juan Carlos Varela and his wife at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. (NHK)

A Ferrari sports car traveling toward Mt. Fuji crashed in the town of Fujikawaguchiko and caught fire on Wednesday. The driver suffered light injuries, police and fire officials said, reports TV Asahi (tokyoreporter.com)

Carlos Ghosn, the former head of the Nissan-Renault automaking alliance, maintained his innocence in a video taken before his fourth arrest in Japan Thursday on new charges of misusing corporate money. (Nikkei)

Kyoto officials have issued warnings to tourists after a series of monkey attacks on visitors at popular sites. (NHK)

“Forgotten Center” instead of “Lost and Found” is just one of the mistranslations discovered on websites that may puzzle foreign tourists in Japan, the government said Wednesday, urging the operators to fix such problems as soon as possible. (Japan Times)

Emperor Akihito canceled his attendance at the rituals and other events scheduled for Wednesday after developing a cough the previous night, the Imperial Household Agency has said. (Japan Times)

The Foreign Ministry confirmed Wednesday the name for Japan’s forthcoming new Imperial era, Reiwa, means “beautiful harmony” in English. (Japan Times)

Japanese authorities have recognized the October 2016 suicide of a man involved in satellite control operations at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Tsukuba Space Center as a work-related death, it was learned Wednesday. (Japan Times)

Police arrested Wednesday an associate professor of a university in Tokyo for killing pigeons in a park by feeding them food mixed with insecticide. (Kyodo)

Major convenience store operator FamilyMart Co. on Tuesday introduced checkouts that use facial recognition technology as the company looks to make adjustments amid a nationwide labor shortage. (Japan Times)

NHK has learned the five proposed names that were not selected to represent Japan's next Imperial era. (NHK)

Japan is struggling with a growing number of foreign patients who fail to pay their medical bills, according to a recent government survey. (Nikkei)