A group comprising Japanese NGO members and students has launched a campaign urging the government to join the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
The group made the announcement in an online event on Friday. Its members are asking Diet legislators and prefectural governors if they favor the treaty. Their views will then be published online.
NHK has learned that the organizing committee for the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics plans to offer refunds for tickets sold in Japan. A formal decision is expected to be announced soon.
The Games are set to take place next year, having been postponed this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Six Japanese scholars have accused the government of breaking a law by rejecting them as members of the country's top academic body.
Four of the scholars held a news conference on Friday at the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Tokyo. Two of them attended via video link.
Three people were injured in bear attacks on Friday in central Japan's Fukui Prefecture.
A bear assaulted a Japan Railways employee in his 50s at around 8:30 a.m. on Friday at the JR Tsuruga Station in the city of Tsuruga.
Workers have begun full-scale restoration work on two dragon-shaped pillars that survived a fire at Shuri Castle in Okinawa Prefecture last year.
The restoration work is open to the public. It began on Friday, ahead of the first anniversary of the fire on October 31. The blaze burned down the castle's main buildings.
The minister in charge of the Science Council of Japan has met the head of the academic body, following the prime minister's recent refusal to appoint six nominees as new members.
Science and Technology Policy Minister Inoue Shinji and Science Council of Japan President Kajita Takaaki met in Tokyo on Friday morning.
A task force is examining reactions from local residents to the Japanese government's plan on how to dispose of the radioactive wastewater stored at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that was hit by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Kajiyama Hiroshi has reiterated his intention to decide on the disposal plan soon, so that the scrapping of the plant will not be delayed.
Tokyo Metropolitan Government officials confirmed 150 new cases of coronavirus infection in the capital on Wednesday.
The figure topped 100 for the second straight day.
The Japanese government has contributed 2.8 million dollars for food aid in Palestine through the United Nations World Food Programme.
Representative of Japan to Palestine, Magoshi Masayuki, and the WFP Representative in Palestine, Stephen Kearney, signed an agreement on Tuesday in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
Narita Airport near Tokyo is slashing landing fees as airlines struggle in the face of the coronavirus.
Narita International Airport Corporation says it is waiving landing charges for domestic passenger flights, and cutting fees for international journeys by about 30 percent.
The Miyagi prefectural assembly has given a nod to restarting a nuclear reactor in the northeastern prefecture of Japan.
If final approval is given by the prefectural governor, the No.2 reactor of Tohoku Electric Power Company's Onagawa plant will be the first to go back online in the region, which was hit hard by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
The mayor of Tokyo's Shibuya Ward has asked people to refrain from coming to the district to celebrate Halloween this year, to prevent spreading of the coronavirus.
Hasebe Ken made the rare call at a news conference on Thursday ahead of Halloween next Saturday.
NHK has learned that Tokyo officials estimate the number of coronavirus tests needed per day will be 7.5 times current capacity if the flu spreads in the capital.
The Tokyo Metropolitan Government made the estimate at the request of the central government.
A group of researchers in Japan says it is using immune cells derived from induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS cells, in a clinical trial for cancer treatment.
The researchers say the clinical test started this month at Chiba University Hospital, near Tokyo, and is the first in the country to apply iPS cells to treat cancer.