A Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force destroyer has left for the Middle East to conduct survey and research activities. It is the first time an MSDF ship has gone on an international mission that will last longer than a year.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe saw off the destroyer Takanami at Yokosuka Naval Base south of Tokyo in a ceremony on Sunday morning.
Officials of Japan's foreign ministry say the next chartered flight to bring Japanese evacuees from China's Hubei Province is likely to be sent late this week.
The government has brought back 565 Japanese so far on three chartered flights from Wuhan, which is the center of the new coronavirus outbreak.
As the number of cases of new coronavirus increase in Japan, false accusations against Chinese people and groundless rumors are spreading. The health ministry is calling on people not to be taken in by the misinformation.
The ministry says false posts on Chinese have gone viral on social media since the outbreak. It says officials have been repeatedly contacted through telephone and email by people passing along the rumor that "Chinese are intentionally spreading the virus for the purpose of terrorism."
All arrivals to Japan from China are now required to complete a questionnaire from the health ministry as part of an increased effort to stop the spread of the deadly new coronavirus.
The ministry started distributing the questionnaire on Saturday to everyone coming into the country, regardless of whether they have symptoms or not.
A helicopter operated by the Fukushima Prefectural police made an emergency landing into a rice field Saturday morning, seriously injuring one person.
Fukushima police say the crashed helicopter was carrying an organ for a heart transplant. Seven people were on board including a doctor, nurse and police personnel.
Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says his country will deny entry to foreign nationals who have recently stayed in the Chinese province of Hubei, starting on Saturday. This is to help prevent the spread of the new strain of coronavirus.
Abe revealed the measure on Friday at a government task force meeting on the new coronavirus infection.
The Japanese government has given the operator of Tokyo's Narita airport approval to build a third runway and extend one of the two existing ones.
The president of Narita International Airport Corporation, Akihiko Tamura, received the license for the project at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism on Friday.
A Japanese government expert panel has agreed to a plan to reduce the amount of radioactive wastewater stored at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, by releasing it into the sea or the air.
Water used to cool the molten nuclear fuel from the March 2011 accident is treated to remove most of the radioactive material. But tritium and some other substances are left in the treated water, and the amount stored has reached about 1.2 million tons in almost 1,000 tanks.