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Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said Tuesday that same-day admission tickets will be introduced for the 2025 World Exposition to be held in Osaka. This was announced at a meeting at the Prime Minister’s Office in Tokyo with Miyagi Gov. Yoshihiro Murai, who heads the National Governors’ Association, and others. “We hope to actively promote the point that people can still enjoy the Expo without an advance ticket, as well as the simplified ticket purchasing procedure,” Ishiba said. Also on Tuesday, the Japan Association for the 2025 World Exposition said that the same-day tickets will be sold every day in front of the entrance gate. The association also said that the “season” pass, priced at ¥30,000 for adults, which allows unlimited entry during the Expo period from April to October, will be discounted to ¥24,000 for those who visit between April and May. Previously, the association planned to admit holders of this pass to the Expo venue only from 11 a.m. The association now said that this limit was abolished. These measures were decided in response to sluggish sales of advance tickets. The number of advance tickets sold stood at 7.87 million as of Wednesday, only 56.2% of the sales target of 14 million tickets. The 2025 Expo association had made it a basic principle for all visitors to buy advance tickets online and book their time slots in order to avoid congestion. But many complained that this procedure was too complicated. In a meeting with Ishiba on Feb. 5, Osaka Gov. Hirofumi Yoshimura suggested improving the ticket selling system. Ishiba hinted at introducing same-day tickets. Source link

Nearly 14 years after the Great East Japan Earthquake struck on March 11, 2011, destroyed buildings that serve as reminders of the disaster are continuing to deteriorate. Local governments looking to preserve the ruins to teach future generations about the destructive nature of the tsunamis that followed the temblor are struggling to maintain them as they erode over time. Last December, a section of an exterior wall at the Okawa Elementary School Ruins in the city of Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, fell off. The tsunami that hit the school, which now forms part of the Ishinomaki Tsunami Ruins, killed 84 faculty members and students. Source link

With massive eyes drawn on her face, a brightly colored vinyl bodysuit and eclectic trinkets and toys glued to her wig, drag queen Rock M. Sakura epitomizes the intersection of Japanese pop culture and international queer culture. As a contender on the 12th season of the American TV series “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” Sakura made a splash in queer Japan-loving circles for her overtly manga and anime-inspired drag persona and makeup. “I often say, ‘I was raised by TV.’ I grew up in the mostly Mexican neighborhood of San Jose, and didn’t have too much connection with Asian American culture,” says Sakura, 34, who is of Vietnamese and Filipino descent. “I was also a bit of a black sheep in my family because I am half-Vietnamese. I had a preconceived notion of what being Asian was, and the only connection I had back then was through media.” Source link

Gunma Prefecture was the most desired relocation destination in Japan in 2024, according to a survey by a nonprofit organization. The survey, conducted by Furusato Kaiki Shien Center, which provides information and support to people who want to move to the countryside, also saw a record number of consultations about relocating out of cities for the fourth year in a row. The survey was conducted among 19,021 respondents who either consulted the center or participated in information sessions it hosted in 2024. While Gunma ranked top among participants of information sessions in 2023, this is the first time that it took first place among people who consulted the center as well. Source link

Hong Kong – A Chinese national political adviser has recommended lowering the legal age for marriage to 18 to boost fertility chances in the face of a declining population and “unleash reproductive potential,” a state-backed newspaper said on Tuesday. Chen Songxi, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), told the Global Times that he plans to submit a proposal on completely relaxing restrictions on childbirth in China and establish an “incentive system” for marriage and childbirth. Chen’s comments come ahead of China’s annual parliamentary meeting next week where officials are expected to announce measures to offset the country’s declining population. Source link

Taipei – Yuichiro Tamaki, head of the opposition Democratic Party for the People, visited Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te at the presidential office in Taipei on Monday for their first meeting. “We agreed that cooperation among democracies, including Japan, Taiwan and South Korea, is important for regional and global stability,” Tamaki told reporters after the meeting. Touching on industrial cooperation between Taiwan and Japan, including on semiconductors, Lai said at the meeting that it is crucial to develop supply chains among democracies. Tamaki also met with Joseph Wu, secretary-general of Taiwan’s National Security Council, former President Tsai Ing-wen and former digital minister Audrey Tang on the same day. Source link

Hong Kong officials this week will unveil plans on how they’ll solve the mounting challenges facing Asia’s financial capital — chief among them slower growth and the longest string of fiscal deficits in two decades. Financial Secretary Paul Chan, who will deliver the city’s annual budget Wednesday, has already flagged a focus on reining in spending that helped push the budget deficit into the red for the third year in a row. The government is also considering tweaks to increase capital, from raising taxes on the highest earners to capping a transport subsidy for seniors and legalizing basketball sports betting. “In the face of the fiscal deficit caused by multiple internal and external challenges in the past few years, this budget will propose an enhanced ‘fiscal consolidation’ strategy,” Chan wrote Sunday in a brief blog post, adding that the city will balance the need to “strictly control” public spending while maintaining services that residents rely on. Source link

A trading room about an hour’s train ride from Tokyo is on the radar of Japanese government bond investors waiting to see whether domestic banks will resume buying the nation’s debt in earnest. Joyo Bank, one of Japan’s largest regional lenders, is holding off from investing in domestic bonds for now, though, according to Yoshitsugu Toba, a managing executive officer at the bank. While his main scenario is for the Bank of Japan to lift interest rates just one more time in July, he also sees the risk that debt yields will climb even further if the BOJ raises rates to around 1.5%, at most, in about three years. There’s keen interest in the market on whether Japan’s regional banks will pour back into benchmark 10-year notes, whose yields jumped to the highest levels since 2009 in Tokyo trading on Friday. Source link

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has urged Group of Seven leaders to unite on bringing peace to war-torn Ukraine, but stressed that the grouping be careful “not to draw the wrong lessons” by backing a process that could validate the use of force to change borders. Ishiba told reporters following a videoconference with his G7 counterparts late Monday that he had expressed hopes that various diplomatic efforts currently being made, including those of the United States, “would bear fruit and help resolve the situation.” But the prime minister also emphasized that in working toward peace, the group “must be careful not to draw the wrong lessons from the situation, which could lead to the possibility of changing the status quo by force.” Source link

KYIV – Ukraine hosted European leaders on Monday to mark three years of all-out war with Russia since Moscow’s invasion, while top U.S. officials stayed away in a clear illustration of President Donald Trump’s lurch towards Moscow since returning to power. Still reeling from Trump falsely calling President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a “dictator,” Kyiv said it was in the final stages of reaching a deal with Washington to provide U.S. access to its mineral wealth. After meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, Trump said Zelenskyy could travel to Washington this week or next to seal the minerals agreement, which he called “very close,” and suggested that the war in Ukraine could end within weeks. But he did not elaborate. Source link