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The Palestinian militant movement Hamas released four female Israeli soldier hostages on Saturday, in return for some 200 Palestinian prisoners, in keeping with a ceasefire agreement aimed at ending the 15-month-old war in Gaza. The four hostages were led onto a podium in Gaza City amid a large crowd of Palestinians and surrounded by dozens of armed Hamas men. They waved and smiled before being led off, entering International Committee of the Red Cross vehicles and being transported to Israeli forces. Hundreds of Israelis gathered at the so-called Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, crying, embracing and cheering as they watched the handover on a giant screen. Source link

The board of Fuji Television Network will meet on Monday as the broadcaster comes under fire over its approach to alleged sexual misconduct involving former TV personality Masahiro Nakai, people familiar with the matter said Saturday. The board is expected to discuss the company’s response to calls for Fuji Television executives, including President Koichi Minato, to take responsibility over the scandal. The company plans to hold an open news conference after the board meeting. News reports say that a Fuji TV employee was involved in the incident in which Nakai allegedly sexually assaulted a woman in June 2023 and paid a large amount of money to her to settle the case. The broadcaster had released a statement that denied an employee’s involvement in the scandal. But it set up a committee of independent lawyers on Thursday to investigate the matter. The committee will come up with a report, possibly by the end of March. Fuji TV had kept airing shows hosted by Nakai despite the allegations. At a news conference on Jan. 17, only a limited number of media were invited and no video was allowed. The broadcaster’s approach has drawn heavy criticism, prompting many companies to pull their commercials from the network. At a meeting of employees on Thursday, many called on Minato and other executives to step down. Source link

As the Los Angeles Dodgers continue to snap up big-name Japanese talent — two-way star Shohei Ohtani and pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto in 2023 and young fireballer Roki Sasaki this year — boxing promoter Bob Arum made it clear there is one Japanese star the MLB club will not get its hands on. “We’re not going to let the Dodgers steal this guy,” Arum joked, referring to undisputed super bantamweight champion Naoya Inoue, who was standing nearby moments after defending his belts with a vicious fourth-round knockout of South Korean challenger Kim Ye-joon at Ariake Arena on Friday night. Inoue might not be wearing a Los Angeles uniform anytime soon, but Japan is going to have to share one of the world’s finest pound-for-pound fighters with the rest of the world in 2025. Source link

Melbourne – Jannik Sinner is wary of “physical beast” Alexander Zverev as the Italian bids to join an elite group with back-to-back Australian Open titles in a final that features the world’s top two players. The ice-cool runaway world No. 1 goes into Sunday’s Melbourne Park decider on a 20-match win streak, dropping just two sets in his six matches so far. Sinner is the favorite to secure a third Grand Slam crown and second at the Australian Open after his maiden triumph over Daniil Medvedev last year. Source link

Nissan Motor may slow a planned ramp-up of electric vehicles made in the U.S. after halting output at a joint venture in Mexico, signaling unease about energy and trade policy under President Donald Trump’s second administration. The start date and production levels for battery-powered cars to be manufactured at a plant in Canton, Mississippi, will depend in large part on whether Trump and the Republican Congress follow through on vows to scrap a $7,500 tax credit and other incentives for buyers and makers of EVs, according to Ponz Pandikuthira, Nissan’s chief planning officer for operations in the Americas. “If they pull back on the $7,500 credit, we know the rate of adoption is going to slow,” Pandikuthira said in an interview. “We certainly don’t want to be in a position of building models there’s no demand for.” Source link

Bank of Japan Gov. Kazuo Ueda raised interest rates to the highest level since 2008, avoiding market turmoil by carefully signaling his plans to investors. But that strategy carries its own risks. Ueda and his board hiked the overnight policy rate to 0.5% on Friday in a move that was almost entirely priced in by traders. The decision left little more than a shallow ripple in global markets, with the yen strengthening slightly against the dollar. Investors are preparing for more hikes to come and the prospect that Japanese rates may reach 1% or more by next year, or even sooner. The relatively smooth reaction contrasts with the market mayhem that followed a far less telegraphed BOJ rate increase at the end of July. Ueda’s move then was blamed by some for triggering the biggest daily fall on record in Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock index and a confidence-sapping slump in markets around the world including U.S. equities. Source link

WASHINGTON – U.S. President Donald Trump took aim at abortion access in the United States and overseas Friday, after promising activists rallying in Washington that he would protect the “historic gains” of the anti-abortion movement. Trump revoked two executive orders signed by Joe Biden protecting abortion access, which the former president put in place after the Supreme Court’s seismic decision to overturn the constitutional right to the procedure in 2022. Biden had moved to protect access to abortion pills and women’s ability to travel to states where the procedure is not banned for care, among other things. Source link

U.S. Vice President JD Vance cast the deciding vote to confirm U.S. secretary of defense nominee Pete Hegseth 51-50 late Friday after the Senate split their vote over the controversial former Fox News host. In a mostly party-line result that saw no Democrats vote for Hegseth, three Republicans — including former GOP leader Mitch McConnell — also joined them in voting against Republican President Donald Trump’s nominee. But the defections were not enough, with Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. The vice president is also the president of the Senate and, in that role, can cast such votes. Vice presidents may only vote to break ties. Hegseth was only the second U.S. Cabinet nominee in history to be confirmed in by a tie-breaking vote. Republicans have a 53-47 majority in the Senate, giving them some breathing room for close votes. Opponents had said Hegseth has nowhere near the experience for the huge job and a disturbing history of heavy drinking and domestic abuse. Indeed, Hegseth’s resume is so thin and his list of alleged personal issues so long that many observers said he was an unusual pick to oversee a nuclear-armed military with about 2.9 million employees and an $850 billion budget. Hegseth has never been at the helm of a large organization. He served as a major in the National Guard but is better known for his role as a host on Fox News. Source link

Week one of the Trump administration was, as advertised, full of excitement in financial markets — just not the kind of excitement most investors had anticipated. The Trump trades that became so popular during the campaign last year — load up on U.S. stocks and the dollar, go light on international stocks and bet against Treasuries — only fared OK. U.S. stocks jumped, sure, but not as much as they did in Japan and Germany or even parts of emerging markets. The dollar tumbled and the Treasury bond market was calm all week, with most yields quietly grinding lower. President Donald Trump conducted plenty of business in his first week in office, signing executive order after executive order, holding impromptu news conferences, mugging for the camera, crisscrossing the country, but it was the one thing he failed to do — immediately slap tariffs on U.S. trade partners — that triggered the surprising market response. Source link

Washington – U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio clashed with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, over Taiwan on Friday, with Donald Trump’s top diplomat denouncing Beijing’s “coercive” moves. Rubio, a longtime China hawk, spoke with Wang for the first time by telephone at the end of his first week in office, which he began by forming a united front with U.S. partners in the region. In the telephone call, Rubio told Wang that the second Trump administration will pursue a relationship with China “that advances U.S. interests and puts the American people first,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said. Source link