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Majority believe Japan needs a lockdown law

Sep 18, 2021 (Japan Times) - Amid the coronavirus pandemic, a majority of people in Japan believe it is necessary to create legislation to make a lockdown possible in the country, a recent opinion poll suggested Friday.

Those who said such legislation is necessary accounted for 56.5 % of the survey’s respondents, while 26 % said the opposite.

Meanwhile, the government’s response to the novel coronavirus crisis was rated negatively by 49.5 %, down by 5.7 percentage points from the previous month. Conversely, those rating the response went up by up 5.4 points to reach 31.1 %.

COVID-19 vaccine rollouts in the country were viewed as slow by 61.3 % of respondents — far higher than the 27.1 % who said that inoculations are steadily under way.

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A Japanese man suspected of serving as a key coordinator for a Cambodia-based fraud syndicate that allegedly caused losses totaling billions of yen was arrested by Japanese authorities after being deported from Thailand on June 16.

A magnitude 5.5 earthquake struck eastern Japan at around 7:46 p.m., with a maximum seismic intensity of lower 5 recorded in parts of Gunma and Saitama prefectures, though no injuries or major damage had been confirmed and there was no risk of a tsunami.

JR Ueno Station has unveiled "Ueno Canvas," a new 75-square-meter LED display featuring videos that highlight the area's cultural attractions, tourism destinations, and artistic heritage as part of a station renovation aimed at connecting people and the city through culture.

Japan's Fair Trade Commission has conducted on-site inspections of six major food manufacturers over suspicions they formed a cartel to coordinate ice cream prices, with authorities investigating whether the companies exchanged information and unfairly adjusted planned retail price increases in response to rising costs.

A parent bear and two cubs were spotted near an interchange in Kyoto Prefecture, just a few minutes' drive from a nursery school, in one of many bear sightings reported across Japan in recent days.

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A 37-year-old man previously arrested for allegedly attempting to set fire to a company and residence operated by a Pakistani national in Ebetsu, Hokkaido, has been rearrested on suspicion of setting a blaze that destroyed a mosque building used as an Islamic place of worship.

A man was found dead after a house fire destroyed a residence in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture, early on June 16, after a police officer on patrol spotted smoke and flames rising from the property.

A stone-skipping tournament on the Nagara River in Gifu Prefecture has drawn attention to 32-year-old Kosei Kigo of Nagoya, whose extraordinary dedication to the childhood pastime includes spending hours searching for the perfect stones, taking private coaching lessons, and competing against some of Japan's top athletes in pursuit of stone-skipping mastery.

More than 900 packs of the food linked to a food poisoning outbreak at a Costco store in Nagoya were sold over a two-day period, health authorities said.

Police in Osaka have arrested 41 men and women in a fraud case involving more than 600 million yen in suspected losses, uncovering what investigators believe was a scheme in which real influencer accounts were bought and used to impersonate their original owners and solicit followers into costly side-business programs.

The number of foreign residents living in Japan surpassed 4 million for the first time by the end of 2025, reaching a record high and underscoring the increasingly important role foreign workers play in supporting the country's labor-short industries.

A court in Shiga Prefecture has sentenced a 29-year-old former sex industry employee to life imprisonment for the murder of a company president, the theft of his cash card, and the disposal of his body in Lake Biwa.

The Hokkaido Community Chest, which operates Japan's annual Red Feather Community Chest fundraising campaign, has revealed that approximately 180 million yen in donated funds are unaccounted for, with a senior official suspected of misappropriating the money over several years.