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A memorial service Crown Prince Akishino attended was held in Tokyo on Monday to mourn the estimated 100,000 victims of the U.S. military’s air raid on the capital 80 years ago. The ceremony took place at the Tokyo metropolitan government’s Memorial Hall in Sumida Ward, attended by bereaved families and Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike, as well as the crown prince and Crown Princess Kiko. “My father, who was kind and committed to our education, died after staying in Tokyo to protect his rice shop,” said Reiko Sato, 93, who survived the raid as she had left Tokyo a few hours before. “We should never repeat the war,” said Sato, who also lost her siblings in World War II. An 88-year-old woman who lost her father and siblings in the raid said that their bodies and bones have not been found. “All I can do is think of them every year at this place,” she said. On March 10, 1945, about 300 U.S. B-29 bombers dropped numerous bombs on Tokyo. It is estimated over 1 million people were displaced by the attack. The Memorial Hall stores the ashes of about 105,000 people who died in Tokyo in the war. Source link

Some of Asia’s biggest central banks are getting a painful refresher in economic theory. Monetary authorities in China, India and elsewhere have waged a prolonged campaign against the strong dollar, using a mix of official reserves and opaque derivatives trades to defend their currencies. But their moves have pushed up borrowing costs for local banks just when slowing economies need more liquidity. China’s overnight and seven-day repo rates surged in February, while bond investors took losses from a sharp rise in yields. Banking liquidity in India suffered its highest deficit in at least 14 years earlier this year and overnight borrowing costs jumped. Liquidity also dried up in Indonesia and Malaysia following central bank currency interventions. Source link

Ofunato, Iwate Pref. – Local authorities on Monday lifted all remaining evacuation orders issued in response to a massive wildfire in the city of Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture. The move came a day after Ofunato Mayor Kiyoshi Fuchigami said that the fire has been contained. The blaze began on Feb. 26 and has burned about 2,900 hectares, or about 9% of the city. A 90-year-old resident of the city was found dead during the fire. “We now see no danger of the fire spreading further,” Fuchigami said at a news conference on Sunday. Firefighters will continue to work to determine whether the fire has been extinguished. According to the city, the wildfire damaged 210 structures, including 102 houses, 76 of which were completely destroyed. Evacuation orders, which had been issued for a total of 4,596 people in 1,896 households in the city, were lifted in stages. Bunsuke Sasaki, 75, a resident who came to check on his house following the lifting of the evacuation order, found it burned down. “It’s disappointing. Nothing is left,” Sasaki said. “I have no choice but to get on, because I grew up here.” Source link

Investors in Japanese corporate bonds are increasingly seeking protection against possible credit deterioration when an issuer becomes a takeover target. Change of Control covenants — which give bondholders certain rights to redeem the debt before maturity if the borrower has a significant change in ownership structure — have until now been very rarely seen in the ¥100 trillion ($680 billion) Japanese credit market. Yet many investors argue that needs to change, with the risks highlighted by future ownership uncertainty of frequent issuers such as convenience store giant Seven & I Holdings and Nissan Motor. “We need a Change of Control covenant on bonds broadly regardless of their credit ratings,” said Hiroyuki Miyata, a credit portfolio manager at Nissay Asset Management. Investing in yen notes without that has become a risk, he said. Source link

A shareholder in Seven & I Holdings is pressuring the company to engage “more deeply” with Alimentation Couche-Tard over its $47.5 billion buyout approach. The operator of 7-Eleven stores responded by saying that it is doing so, and rebuffed Artisan Partners Asset Management’s assertions of conflicts of interest within the board. Couche-Tard, the Canadian convenience store and gas station operator that owns the Circle K brand, proposed last year to purchase Seven & I for $18.19 per share, but hasn’t been able to enter negotiations with the Japanese company. Seven & I has been fending off the approach by pursuing an overhaul of the company to unlock shareholder value. It announced last week sweeping changes, including board director Stephen Dacus taking over as chief executive officer, the sale of its superstore business for $5.4 billion, a share buyback program worth ¥2 trillion ($13.5 billion) and a listing of its U.S. business. Source link

DAMASCUS – Syria’s leader vowed on Sunday to hunt down the perpetrators of violent clashes pitting loyalists of deposed President Bashar Assad against the country’s new Islamist rulers and said he would hold to account anyone who overstepped their authority. The clashes, which a war monitoring group said had already killed over 1,000 people, mostly civilians, continued for a fourth day in Assad’s coastal heartland. In a speech broadcast on national television and posted on social media, Ahmed Sharaa, whose rebel movement toppled Assad in December, accused Assad loyalists and foreign powers that he did not name of trying to foment unrest. Source link

Mark Carney won the race to become Canada’s next prime minister, putting the former central banker in charge of the country just as U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration threatens its economic future. The ex-Bank of Canada and Bank of England governor won the contest to lead the Liberal Party of Canada with 85.9% of the vote. The transfer of power from Justin Trudeau to Carney is expected to take place within days. Carney, 59, takes the reins at a time when the White House is creating upheaval in the global economy — and with U.S. trading partners — with increasingly chaotic tariff announcements. Source link

“The Place of Shells” by Mai Ishizawa, a strange and slim novel of erudition, captures the emotional haze in the aftermath of disaster. Ishizawa’s debut novel, which won one of the three Akutagawa Prizes awarded in 2021, is also her first to be released in English, translated by Polly Barton. It takes place in the summer of 2020, in the months following the global outbreak of COVID-19. In 2025, pandemic literature may seem “too soon,” but “The Place of Shells” is not an in-your-face book about death and disease, or failed policies and moral panic, but a work of quiet grief and guilt. Source link

Sendai, Miyagi Pref. – Some municipalities in northeastern Japan are ending the storage of personal items — such as photographs, school bags, and cell phones — that were collected after the Great East Japan Earthquake in March 2011 and have yet to be returned to their owners. Of the 37 coastal municipalities in Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures that were hit hardest by the disaster, 11 have already stopped holding such items, while six others have never stored them, a Jiji Press survey found. Among the 11 municipalities, the Fukushima town of Namie closed its exhibition of such personal items in March 2021, citing related costs and a decline in the number of items returned to owners. The remaining 20 municipalities continue storing the personal items, but the Fukushima city of Iwaki, among them, has decided to discontinue the practice. A city official said that the number of people coming to collect their belongings is decreasing, reflecting the changing attitudes of the people affected by the disaster. The Iwate city of Kamaishi is also considering ending its storage of such items at the end of March 2026. When asked what is needed to continue storing collected personal items, 16 municipalities cited the need for storage and display space, while 10 mentioned budget constraints. Nine municipalities expressed the desire to continue storing the items, with the town of Otsuchi in Iwate stating that the project is “necessary, in part, to prevent the disaster from being forgotten.” Source link

Hiroshima – Italian President Sergio Mattarella visited Hiroshima on Saturday where he laid flowers at the cenotaph for the victims of the 1945 atomic bombing in Peace Memorial Park. It marked his first visit to the city. The president observed a moment of silent in front of the cenotaph and then toured the park, accompanied by Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui. He also signed an entry at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum within the park. Later in the day, Mattarella met with people including Hiroshima Gov. Hidehiko Yuzaki and Toshiyuki Mimaki, 82, co-chair of the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations, also known as Nihon Hidankyo, which won the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize. The president congratulated Mimaki and others on the group’s Nobel win, praising their work for consistently sounding a stern alarm for humanity and emphasizing his strong belief that nuclear weapons must never be used again. “I realized that (the president) has the same idea (about nuclear disarmament) with us,” Mimaki told reporters after the meeting. “We would like him to continue to work (for nuclear disarmament).” Source link