The following is the latest list of selected news summaries by Kyodo News.
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All 4 Japan PM hopefuls welcome Taiwan's bid to join TPP
TOKYO - All four candidates vying to become Japan's next prime minister welcomed Friday Taiwan's application to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade agreement.
Vaccination minister Taro Kono, former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, former internal affairs minister Sanae Takaichi and former gender equality minister Seiko Noda threw their support behind Taiwan in an online town hall meeting for the presidential election of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party slated for Wednesday.
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Quad leaders eye safe chip supply chain, update on vaccine efforts
WASHINGTON - The leaders of the United States, Japan, Australia and India are set to agree to bolster supply chain security for semiconductors and affirm progress toward their goal of supplying coronavirus vaccines across Asia during their first in-person summit on Friday, a U.S. official said.
The "Quad" meeting, which follows a virtual summit in March, is expected to showcase deepening ties toward advancing a "free and open" Indo-Pacific amid China's growing assertiveness, with discussions also to include partnering on emerging technologies, such as 5G telecommunication networks, and cooperation on space.
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North Korea will reject proposal from South to declare Korean War over
BEIJING - North Korea will reject any South Korean proposal to declare a formal end to the 1950-1953 Korean War unless the United States withdraws its "hostile policy" toward Pyongyang, state-run media reported Friday, citing the nation's vice foreign minister.
South Korean President Moon Jae In said in a speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday that the two Koreas should formally end the war while urging the United States and North Korea to hold talks aimed at bringing about the denuclearization of the latter.
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SBI flags extension of tender offer if Shinsei Bank meets demands
TOKYO - SBI Holdings Inc. said Friday it will extend its unsolicited tender offer for Shinsei Bank by one month if the bank meets conditions set for it after a hostile takeover bid by the major online financial group raised tensions between the parties.
SBI demanded Shinsei not attempt to buy time by posing "low-priority" questions, and that it hold an extraordinary shareholders' meeting as soon as possible and in an equitable manner.
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Japan to lower minimum age to 16 at state-run vaccination sites
TOKYO - Japan's state-run mass COVID-19 inoculation centers are looking into giving shots to people aged 16 or over, Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi said Friday, lowering the minimum age from 18 amid the spread of the virus among younger people.
The move by the centers in Tokyo and Osaka, which are run by the Self-Defense Forces, comes as the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus leads to more infections among children.
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Japan, India leaders oppose China attempt to alter status quo
WASHINGTON - Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday expressed "strong opposition" to unilateral attempts to change the maritime status quo, the Japanese government said, alluding to Beijing's assertiveness in regional waters.
Their first in-person summit in Washington took place ahead of a meeting of the Quad group, which will also be joined by U.S. and Australian leaders to discuss issues that are expected to help push back against China's growing clout in the Indo-Pacific region.
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Man ordered to pay 70 mil. yen over 2017 murder of Vietnamese girl
TOKYO - A Japanese court on Friday ordered a man currently appealing his life sentence for the 2017 murder of a 9-year-old Vietnamese girl to pay a total of 70 million yen ($634,000) in damages to her parents.
The parents of Le Thi Nhat Linh had filed the lawsuit at the Tokyo District Court against Yasumasa Shibuya, the 50-year-old former head of a parents group at Mutsumi Daini Elementary School in Matsudo near Tokyo, over the murder of their daughter, who was a third-grader at the school.
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Football: Mallorca's Takefusa Kubo reveals injury on Instagram, will miss time
TOKYO - Real Mallorca and Japan midfielder Takefusa Kubo has been sidelined after taking a knock to his knee during a match, the player revealed in a social media post on Thursday.
"I hurt my knee while playing in yesterday's match and will have to spend a little time off the pitch," the 20-year-old Real Madrid loanee wrote on Instagram.
