Japan on Tuesday approved an increase in compensation payments for the Fukushima crisis to 7.07 trillion yen ($57.18 billion), as tens of thousands of evacuees remain in temporary housing more than four years after the disaster.
China reserves the right to a "necessary reaction" after Japan issued a defense review that called on Beijing to stop building oil and gas exploration platforms close to disputed waters in the East China Sea, the Defense Ministry has said.
Japan called on China on Tuesday to halt construction of oil-and-gas exploration platforms in the East China Sea close to waters claimed by both nations, concerned that Chinese drills could tap reservoirs that extend into Japanese territory.
Toshiba Corp's (6502.T) chief executive stepped down on Tuesday after an independent investigation found he had been aware the company had inflated its profits, in the country's biggest corporate scandal in years.
Toshiba Corp Chief Executive Hisao Tanaka will step down in September along with other board members including Vice Chairman Norio Sasaki to take responsibility for accounting irregularities, sources familiar with the matter said.
Japan cannot use military strength to counter China, Hayao Miyazaki, famed director of the Oscar-winning film "Spirited Away", said on Monday, as he joined a chorus of protest against a change in Japan's security policy.
Japan is interested in joining a NATO missile building consortium that would give Tokyo its first taste of a multinational defense project, a move the U.S. Navy is encouraging because it could pave the way for Japan to lead similar partnerships in Asia, sources said.
The Philippines will hold separate naval exercises with U.S. and Japanese forces this week on a Philippine island that is not far from the disputed Spratly archipelago, where China's rapid creation of seven island outposts is stoking regional tensions.
Philippine President Benigno Aquino made a veiled comparison on Wednesday between China's activities in the South China Sea and Nazi Germany's expansionism before World War Two, echoing similar remarks he made last year that outraged Beijing.
Japan will join a major U.S.-Australian military exercise for the first time in a sign of growing security links between the three countries as tensions fester over China's island building in the South China Sea.
More than 450 mostly Western scholars have urged Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to confront boldly Japan's wartime past, the latest sign that the conservative leader has not erased concern that he wants to dilute past apologies.
Japan's cabinet approved on Thursday bills to implement a drastic shift in security policy allowing the military to fight abroad for the first time since World War Two, although the public is divided and wary over the changes.
The U.S. Marine Corps is bringing together foreign commanders from amphibious forces deployed mostly in the Asia-Pacific for a conference aimed at taking steps to integrate operations, with China excluded from the event, according to officials and planning documents.
Japanese ruling party officials signed off on Monday on bills to implement a drastic change in security policy that would expand the role of the nation's military in the U.S.-Japan alliance and allow it to fight abroad for the first time since World War Two.
China's military warned on Saturday of the need for a high degree of vigilance against attempts in Japan to deny its history of aggression, ahead of President Xi Jinping's attendance at World War Two commemorations in Moscow.
Japan's military is considering joining the United States in maritime air patrols in the South China Sea in response to China's increasingly assertive pursuit of territorial claims, a Japanese and a U.S. source familiar with the discussions said.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told Japanese leaders on Monday that Washington's treaty commitments to Japan's security remain "iron-clad" and cover all territories under Tokyo's administration, including tiny islands in the East China Sea that China also claims.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's ruling party wants to revise Japan's constitution by late 2018 to remove constraints on his defense strategy, a key party lawmaker said, an ambitious target since the charter has not been changed since Americans drafted it after World War Two.
The Japanese military could expand its role and missions around the world under new U.S.-Japan defense guidelines that are expected to be released on Monday and may cause unease in China.
An 88-year-old South Korean woman forced to become a sex slave in Japanese military brothels during World War Two on Friday called on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to apologize and restore her "honor" when he visits Washington next week.
A Japanese man has been arrested for landing a drone on the prime minister's office with a minuscule amount of radiation in an apparent protest against the use of nuclear power, four years after the Fukushima disaster.
