A 32-year-old man was arrested Saturday for arson after a fire gutted the house where he lived in the central Japan prefecture of Nagano, apparently killing three of his family members, police said. (Kyodo)

Twenty-year-old Sota Fujii became only the second player in the history of the shogi board game to hold six major titles Sunday when he took the Kio crown from Akira Watanabe. (Kyodo)

A teenage girl was arrested on Saturday for allegedly killing a man at a hotel in Toyama Prefecture in central Japan, police said. (Kyodo)

The government in the western Japan prefecture of Kagawa has called on local hotel operators to stop asking foreign residents for identification when they check in, local officials said Thursday. (Kyodo)

The number of women committing suicide in Japan increased for the third straight year in 2022, rising 67 from the previous year to 7,135, government data showed Tuesday, with the upward trend apparently fueled by the coronavirus pandemic. (Kyodo)

Japan's Cabinet approved a bill Tuesday to recognize a sexual violation even in the absence of physical violence or coercion and raise the age of sexual consent from 13 to 16, as part of reforms to the country's Penal Code. (Kyodo)

A Tokyo court ordered Monday that the case against a former professional boxer, who was sentenced to death over a 1966 quadruple murder case in Shizuoka Prefecture in central Japan, be retried. (Kyodo)

The former head of the operator of a southwestern Japan inn, who came under fire for only changing hot spring bathwater twice a year, allowing legionella bacteria to proliferate beyond the allowable limit, has died in a suspected suicide, police said Sunday. (Kyodo)

Around 70 percent of flight attendants in Japan have reported that photos had been or likely had been taken of them surreptitiously, an aviation trade union said Thursday, calling for tougher penalties against the act. (Kyodo)

The Diamond Princess liner returned to Yokohama near Tokyo on Friday for the first time since a mass COVID outbreak three years ago led Japan to quarantine those onboard and suspend the arrival of foreign cruise ships until this month. (Kyodo)

A high court upheld on Thursday a sentence of 15 years in prison given to a woman for manipulating a fellow mother to starve her 5-year-old son to death in the southwestern Japan prefecture of Fukuoka in 2020. (Kyodo)

Japan ranked second from last among developed nations with regard to the role and influence of women in the workforce for the seventh straight year, according to an index compiled by British magazine The Economist. (Kyodo)

Police in Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture, have arrested a 27-year-old man on suspicion of stealing women’s underwear from a coin-operated laundromat and injuring the laundromat owner, as he fled the scene by car. (Japan Today)

A 13-year-old boy slashed a classmate with a kitchen knife at a junior high school in Hiroshima on Friday, causing minor injuries to the victim, the local education board said, in the second knife attack to take place in a Japanese school this week. (Kyodo)

Japan's government decided on Friday to enable courts to order the use of GPS trackers to prevent international bail jumping in the wake of the case of former Nissan Motor Co. CEO Carlos Ghosn and other incidents of criminal defendants escaping the country. (Kyodo)

A former member of KAT-TUN, an all-male idol group, has been sentenced to 16 months in prison after being found guilty of violating the Stimulants Control Law. (Japan Today)

The operator of a century-old ryokan inn in southwestern Japan on Tuesday admitted telling staff not to regularly change its hot-spring bathwater, which led to levels of legionella bacteria as much as 3,700 times over standard limits. (Kyodo)

Japan cruised past Bahrain 95-72 on Sunday in its final match of Asian qualifying for the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup. (Kyodo)

Two-time Olympic figure skating champion Yuzuru Hanyu had a solo ice show at Tokyo Dome on Sunday, making him the first skater to do so there. (Kyodo)

Arrivals of foreign-operated cruise ships to Japan are set to near the level seen before the coronavirus pandemic when their dockings to the country resume in March after a three-year hiatus, a Kyodo News survey showed Sunday. (Kyodo)

Researchers in Japan are working to reduce the climate impact of cow burps by developing stomach sensors and using artificial intelligence to effectively administer feed that inhibits methane production. (Kyodo)

Police in Fujisawa, Kanagawa Prefecture, have arrested a 27-year-old woman on suspicion of fatally abusing her two-year-old son in 2022. (Japan Today)

Police in Tokyo have arrested an 82-year-old man on suspicion of sexual assaulting a woman in her 30s after he put sleeping pills in soup that he gave to her. (Japan Today)

The disciplinary committee of Japan's upper house agreed Tuesday to order a YouTuber-turned-lawmaker living abroad to offer an apology in parliament for not attending any sessions since he was elected to the Diet last year. (Kyodo)

Fukuoka prefectural police said Sunday that a 26-year-old man who was found dead along a coastal road on Friday was strangled to death. (Japan Today)