Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on January 2013

INCREDIBLE SHRINKING JAPAN

• The health ministry estimates that a record-low number of babies were born in Japan in 2012.
• The ministry also said that the natural population decline—the number deaths minus the number of births—topped 200,000 for just the second time ever.
• Meanwhile, the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research estimates that Japan’s population will drop to 86.74 million from its current 125.95 million by the year 2060.
• Members of a gang suspected of carrying out the fatal beating of a man in a Roppongi nightclub last September are being referred to as hangure—or “half-hoodlums”—because they’re not affiliated with traditional crime syndicates.

LIFTOFF!

• The media got its first glimpse of the spiffy new Hayabusa 2 space probe, which Japan’s space agency hopes will rendezvous with an asteroid “on a hunt for organic compounds.”
• A 40-year-old Japanese man was arrested for lobbing a smoke bomb at the South Korean consulate in Kobe.
• Employees of the Lawson convenience store chain who fail to undergo company-mandated health checks will be liable for a 15 percent cut in their annual bonuses.
• This being Japan, the employees’ direct supervisors will be expected to fall on their swords and take a bonus cut as well.

THE TROUBLE WITH CHINA

• The NPA has found that 90 percent of illegal online money transfers in 2012 were “made to accounts held by Chinese nationals.”
• Major Japanese travel agencies report that package-tour bookings for Europe have risen by 40 percent compared to last year, but the number of travelers to China has plunged by 85 percent.
• Members of the Coast Guard arrested the captain of a Chinese fishing boat inside Japan’s EEZ after 1.5kg of coral was found aboard his vessel.
• Sentence of the Week: “The Chinese Embassy in Tokyo has dismissed the significance of 1950 Chinese diplomatic document that referred to a cluster of islands disputed with Japan by their Japanese name and indicated they are part of the Ryukyu Islands.” (via Kyodo)

LOST & FOUND

• Scholars have determined that a pastel drawing of a girl on display at a public health center in Nagano is actually the work of celebrated illustrator Chihiro Iwasaki (1918-1974). They described the find as a “valuable discovery.”
• The head of the general affairs department at Kiyose City in Tokyo offered an apology after 151 personal documents of local residents—birth, marriage and death certificates, among them—were found inside a men’s restroom at JR Tachikawa station.
• A survey conducted by an anti-death-penalty lawyer found that more than half of Japanese death-row inmates favor a review of the current method of execution—hanging—and that 35 percent would prefer to be put to death by lethal injection.
• A newspaper survey found that 13 out of 50 reactors at nuclear power plants in Japan have deficient fire-prevention equipment.

HERE WE GO AGAIN

• Health officials in Russia “have not ruled out the possibility” of limiting food imports from Japan in the wake of recent outbreaks of norovirus infections.
• As if they didn’t have enough to worry about, kids in Fukushima were found to be at increased risk of obesity due to “a lack of physical exercise and stress stemming from prolonged living in shelters and restrictions on playing outside.”
• An official at the agriculture ministry revealed that a recent cyberattack targeted “[c]onfidential documents… linked to the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade initiative.”
• Bottom Story of the Week: “New President of Japan Shogi Association Enthusiastic About Role” (via The Mainichi)

Compiled from reports by AP, Japan Today, The Japan Times, Jiji, The Tokyo Reporter, Japan Probe, The Mainichi, Daily Yomiuri, AFP, Reuters and Kyodo