Austria's stricter immigration controls are jeopardizing classes at the Japanese School in Vienna, as two teachers failed to obtain visas before their visa-free stays in the country expired Saturday. (Japan Today)

A 4-year-old boy was found safe in a forest in Shizuoka Prefecture on Monday, 45 hours after going missing. (Japan Times)

A dog checked as cargo by a passenger on a Japan Airlines flight from Tokyo's Haneda airport Monday morning escaped before being loaded onto the plane, causing a runway to be shut temporarily and disrupting a total of 14 flights. (Kyodo)

Graffiti has been found in dozens of locations at Zenkoji Buddhist Temple, a major tourist attraction in central Japan. (NHK)

Championship leader Lewis Hamilton won the Japanese Grand Prix on Sunday, taking a major step toward winning his third Formula One title. (Japan Today)

Dentsu Inc was fined just 500,000 yen after a Tokyo court ruled it had made employees work overtime beyond legal limits - a case that followed a high profile death from overwork at the advertising giant. (Japan Today)

A drunk university student caused a delay in railway services after he was seen walking along a track bed in west Tokyo on Friday, reports the Asahi Shimbun (tokyoreporter.com)

As Japan moves within striking distance of beating the deflation that has plagued the nation for so many years, the leading parties in the Oct. 22 general election have laid out platforms that lean worryingly close to populism rather than offer ways to parlay this progress into stable economic growth. (Nikkei)

About 500 people enjoyed the first outdoor ski run of the season in Japan at a resort at the base of Mt. Fuji. The slope in Susono City in Shizuoka Prefecture opened on Friday. (NHK)

A magnitude 5-point-9 earthquake has struck northeastern Japan. (NHK)

Japanese beef bowl purveyor Yoshinoya Holdings posted its biggest first-half profit in a decade Friday, thanks to a spiced-up menu, putting the company on the road to shedding its underdog status among industry peers. (Nikkei)

The sale of old manhole covers by a city north of Tokyo has attracted many buyers amid the growing popularity in the metal lids featuring designs inspired by local landmarks and specialties. (NHK)

Researchers at Kyoto University in Japan have started what they say is the world's first clinical trial of medicine found through iPS cell studies. (NHK)

Google and LINE have announced that they will each launch AI speakers that handle the Japanese language. (NHK)

Novelist Kazuo Ishiguro, best known for his book “The Remains of the Day,” has been awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize in Literature. (the-japan-news.com)

A new party led by Tokyo Gov Yuriko Koike has unveiled policies it dubs "Yurinomics" that aim to revitalise the economy and cut reliance on fiscal spending and monetary easing, seeking to distance itself from Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's more aggressive stimulus measures. (Japan Today)

Six people were found dead after a fire engulfed an apartment in Ibaraki Prefecture early Friday morning, and a 32-year-old man who claimed to have deliberately started the blaze turned himself in to police. (Japan Times)

Daito Bunka University located in Tokyo’s Itabashi Ward has received its fifth bomb threat this year, police and university officials said Wednesday. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department said the person responsible faces charges of forcible obstruction of business. (Japan Today)

New rules requiring greater scrutiny of applicants from five countries have landed Japanese-language schools with that little bit more paperwork. (Japan Times)

Tokyo 2020 Olympic organizers said on Wednesday that tests showed levels of E. Coli up to 20 times above the accepted limit and fecal coliform bacteria seven times higher than agreed at the planned venue for marathon swimming and triathlon. (Japan Today)

Retailer Takashimaya has opened a specialty section in one of its Tokyo department stores that sells only robots. Most of them cost between 900 and 2,700 dollars. (NHK)

While the Federal Reserve is entering the final phase of its exit strategy, there is no end in sight for the BOJ's massive monetary easing policy, which has seen nothing but expansion during Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda's term. (Nikkei)

A 31-year-old male driver briefly fell asleep at the controls of a commuter train traveling at 120 kilometers per hour in the Tokyo metropolitan area in September, the railway operator said Tuesday. (Japan Today)

Yokozuna Hakuho received a special award from an advisory body of the Japan Sumo Association on Wednesday, commemorating the record of all-time wins of 1,050 he set in July. (Japan Times)

Japan accepted just three refugees in the first half of 2017 despite receiving a record 8,561 fresh asylum applications, the government said on Tuesday, highlighting the nation's reluctance to accept foreigners. (Japan Today)