Japan's Prime Minister Kishida Fumio has instructed ministers to raise the annual defense and other related budgets to 2 percent of the country's gross domestic product in fiscal 2027.

Kishida met with Defense Minister Hamada Yasukazu and Finance Minister Suzuki Shunichi on Monday evening. He told them he will decide how to ensure an increase in defense spending after reviewing both revenue and expenditures by yearend. He urged the two to discuss the matter with the ruling coalition parties.

A survey shows that nearly 60 percent of children in Japan's low-income households are bearing the brunt of recent higher prices in terms of education.

Kidsdoor, a non-profit organization whose mission is to address child poverty, conducted the survey this month among families it supports and 1,846 people responded.

Japan's Emperor Naruhito has left a Tokyo hospital after undergoing a prostate biopsy, or examination of tissue samples.

The Emperor bowed to people and smiled from his car as he left the University of Tokyo Hospital on Monday morning. He had entered the hospital the previous day.

Japan's Emperor Naruhito has visited a hospital to have his prostate examined again after the previous test results showed some slightly concerning data.

The Emperor left the Imperial Palace on Sunday morning to visit a hospital in Tokyo.

Fans and supporters of the Japan squad are praying for the team's victory in the FIFA World Cup soccer tournament at a shrine which features the symbol of the Japan Football Association.

The symbol is a three-legged crow named "Yatagarasu." It is associated with the Kumano Kotai Shrine in the town of Karuizawa, Nagano Prefecture.

Japan Coast Guard officials say two Chinese government ships have entered Japan's territorial waters off the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea.

The officials say the ships entered the waters off Minamikojima island at around 2:40 a.m. on Friday, after navigating in the contiguous zone just outside the territorial waters with two other Chinese government ships.

German media have reacted with shock to the country's loss to Japan in their opening match at the World Cup soccer tournament in Qatar.

Wednesday's online edition of Sport Bild had a headline saying, "Debacle start for Germany!"

The United Nations' cultural agency UNESCO has decided to register traditional Japanese techniques used in wooden architecture to its Intangible Cultural Heritage list.

The Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage discussed Japan's proposal and reached the decision in an online panel meeting on Thursday.

Japan's Mitsubishi Aircraft plans to slash staff as work to develop the country's first domestically-produced passenger jet grinds to a halt.

Sources say the company will cut its workforce by about 95 percent year-on-year from next April, to a bare minimum of roughly 150.

NHK has learned that Japan's defense budget for fiscal 2021 is likely to be around 51 billion dollars -- a record high. The budget would be higher for nine years in a row.

The Defense Ministry has been negotiating its budget request with the Finance Ministry before the government compiles the budget plan late this month.

Japan's Environment Ministry says the country's greenhouse gas emissions for the fiscal year that ended in March hit a record low.

The ministry's preliminary figures show Japan's domestic emissions in fiscal 2019 amounted to a carbon dioxide equivalent of 1.213 billion tons. That's down 34 million tons, or 2.7 percent, from the previous year and is the sixth straight annual decline.

Japan's defense minister has ordered the Self-Defense Forces to send nurses to the prefecture of Hokkaido to help ease the shortage of healthcare workers due to the coronavirus.

GENEVA — A panel of human rights experts working with the United Nations said Monday that former Renault-Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn was wrongly detained in Japan and has urged "compensation" and "other reparations" for him from the Japanese government.

In an opinion published Monday, the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that Ghosn's arrest in Japan in late 2018 and early 2019 was "arbitrary" and called on Japan's government to "take the necessary steps to remedy the situation of Mr. Ghosn without delay." A determination of whether detention is arbitrary is based on various criteria, including international norms of justice.

Data released by a group of researchers show the average 10-year survival rate of cancer patients in Japan stands at 58.3 percent.

The group analyzed data samples of more than 94,000 people who were diagnosed with cancer at 21 cancer treatment institutions across the country between 2004 and 2007.