The coronavirus continues to spread in Japan, with several prefectures reporting more than 100 cases on Tuesday.

The daily tally in Tokyo topped 100 for 8 days in a row. The number of cases tends to be low on Monday and Tuesday because fewer virus tests are conducted over weekends.

Japanese Prime Minister Suga Yoshihide has instructed his coronavirus taskforce to use all available means to prevent the spread of the virus, as the daily number of new cases increases ahead of the winter season.

Suga noted at a taskforce meeting on Tuesday that the national daily tally has exceeded 1,000 recently, and said the government needs to respond to the situation with the strongest sense of urgency.

International gymnastic officials have shared information on anti-coronavirus measures taken at their recent event with Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic organizers.

The Friendship and Solidarity Competition in Tokyo on Sunday was the first international meet for an Olympic sport held in Japan since the pandemic began.

Japan's Prime Minister Suga Yoshihide has called on South Korea to take the initiative in restoring healthy bilateral relations.

Suga made the remark in a meeting with South Korea's National Intelligence Service Director Park Jie-won in Tokyo on Tuesday.

Japan's weather officials will stop observations of about 90 percent of plants and animals that have continued for nearly 70 years.

The Meteorological Agency began observing the flowering of plants and the first chirping of animals in 1953 to report changes in season and climate.

The number of suicides in Japan rose for a fourth straight month in October.

The National Police Agency says the number of people who took their lives last month was 2,153, up 39.9 percent from a year earlier. The monthly total is the highest in the past five years.

The Lower House of Japan's Diet has begun deliberating on a bill to revise the preventive vaccination law to secure vaccines for the coronavirus.

The bill would make coronavirus vaccinations free. If the vaccines are found to cause health problems, the government will pay for treatment.

Prime Minister Suga Yoshihide has pledged to work with the government of Japan's northern prefecture of Hokkaido to curb the spread of the coronavirus there.

Hokkaido Governor Suzuki Naomichi visited the prime minister's office in Tokyo on Tuesday to brief Suga about the recent surge of infections in his prefecture.

The Japanese government has decided to extend by another year the Maritime Self-Defense Force's counter-piracy mission off the coast of Somalia.

Japan has deployed destroyers and patrol aircraft to guard commercial ships in the area based on the anti-piracy law since 2009. The current mission is scheduled to expire on Thursday next week.

Members of Japan's Imperial family have celebrated Crown Prince Akishino's public proclamation as heir to the throne.

Emperor Naruhito, Empress Masako and Crown Prince and Princess Akishino arrived at the Imperial Palace through the Hanzomon Gate on Tuesday morning.

Astronauts heading for the International Space Station on board the first operational flight of a privately-developed space capsule have shared their thoughts ahead of the launch later this week.

Commander Michael Hopkins and two other US astronauts from NASA as well as Japanese astronaut Noguchi Soichi will be on board the Crew Dragon spacecraft, developed by SpaceX.

Tokyo Metropolitan Government officials confirmed 293 new cases of the coronavirus in the capital on Tuesday.

The figure is the second-highest tally for a Tuesday since the virus was first confirmed in Tokyo in January.

NHK has learned that Miyagi Prefecture in northeastern Japan now allows its residents living near a nuclear power plant to receive iodine tablets by mail to minimize person-to-person contact and help prevent coronavirus infection.

The prefecture changed its rule in response to a call from the central government's Cabinet Office to consider ways to distribute the tablets without such contact.

The animated movie "Kimetsu no Yaiba," or "Demon Slayer," has earned 20 billion yen in its first 24 days in theaters across Japan. It reached the milestone much faster than the 59 days it took the 2001 animated fantasy film "Spirited Away."

The film's distributor, Toho, says more than 15.3 million people watched the movie in theaters from October 16 to Sunday. It raked in 20.4 billion yen, or nearly 200 million dollars.