Mika Yamamoto, veteran war correspondent for the Japan Press, killed in Syria covering civil war
News On Japan via nydailynews.com -- Aug 22
A Japanese journalist has been killed in Syria while covering the civil war there, Japan's government said Tuesday.
Mika Yamamoto, a veteran war correspondent with the Japan Press, an independent TV news provider that specializes in conflict zone coverage, was killed in Syria while reporting, said Masaru Sato, a spokesman with the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo
Yamamoto was with a colleague from Tokyo-based Japan Press when she was killed, Sato said. It wasn't clear when or where she died.
Her body has been transferred to Turkey, where Japanese consular officials were providing assistance, Sato said.
Yamamoto had reported from Afghanistan on the war there after 2001, and covered the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq from Baghdad as a special correspondent for NTV, according to Japan Press' website. She was born in 1967, it said.
A video posted on YouTube on Monday by an activist in Syria shows the dead body of an Asian woman inside a van wrapped in blankets with only her face showing.
A collection of materials related to a 17th century mission sent by a Japanese feudal lord to Europe and the world's oldest autographic diary left 10 centuries ago by a Japanese regent have been selected for the UNESCO Memory of the World registry, the Japanese education ministry said Wednesday. (Global Post )
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Police said Tuesday that a mummified body was found earlier this month in a storage cabinet in a restaurant in Morioka, Iwate Prefecture. (Japan Today )
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Mt. Fuji, the tallest mountain in Japan, will likely see its summer "traffic jam" of climbers worsen this year thanks to its expected addition to the UNESCO World Heritage List. (Yomiuri )
In May, Akira Ikoma, the editor of a guide to men's entertainment called Ore no Tabi (My Journey), said that "Abenomics" had caused a spike in prices at high-end soapland bathhouses in Tokyo. However, the same editor tells Shukan Post (June 28) that the initiative is not impacting the low-end market in the same way. (Tokyo Reporter )
Police said Monday they have arrested a 64-year-old woman in connection with the murder of her 59-year-old partner in Seki, Gifu Prefecture. (Japan Today )
Tokyo Metropolitan Police on Monday announced the bust of a massage parlor in the Gotanda area of Shinagawa Ward on charges of prostitution. (Tokyo Reporter )
Tokyo District Court decided on Monday to open planned examinations of three witnesses who are former senior members of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult and now death-row inmates, during an upcoming trial of another former senior Aum member. (Jiji Press )