Theme: Japan

Japanese companies suffered 239 ransomware attacks from January to October, more than double the 2021 total, according to a survey by security firm Macnica. The count by Yokohama-based Macnica includes attacks without data encryption and already exceeds the 228 cases recorded in all of 2025, a new annual record. Among 100 Japanese firms surveyed by Proofpoint, the ransomware infection rate jumped to 73% in 2025 from 38% in the 2023 survey, the largest increase among 11 comparable countries — and about 40% of organizations that paid ransoms failed to recover data or regain access after a single payment, many facing additional demands.

Japan’s Defense Ministry has estimated that its five-year defense plan beginning in fiscal 2027 will require about 80 trillion yen (about $507 billion), nearly twice the amount allocated under the current plan. The figure is preliminary: given funding constraints, the government is expected to review equipment procurement and other expenditures and adjust the total toward the upper end of the 70 trillion yen (about $443.5 billion) range. The new spending is likely to fund purchases such as large numbers of drones, according to a source familiar with the matter. The review is taking shape as a year-end deadline for revisions to three key security documents looms.

Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi on Tuesday again called for discussions on reviewing the country’s Three Non-Nuclear Principles and expressed support for considering the introduction of nuclear-powered submarines, Kyodo News reported. Speaking at a seminar in Tokyo, Koizumi said an environment should be created in which necessary security policies can be discussed openly and frankly without prejudice, and that as Japan revises its three key security documents by the end of the year, society as a whole should develop a shared understanding of nuclear threats. The Three Non-Nuclear Principles stipulate that the country will not possess, produce or permit the introduction of nuclear weapons, and the current National Security Strategy explicitly states that the policy will remain unchanged. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told parliament in October that her government would “deepen concrete and realistic considerations” regarding the potential introduction of nuclear-powered submarines for the Self-Defense Forces.

Ransomware attacks on Japanese companies have more than doubled in five years.

Japan’s government is considering financial aid to the International Criminal Court (ICC), which has been hit by sanctions, following a call from the court’s president, according to Kyodo News.

Japan Investment Corp (JIC), a Japanese state-backed fund, plans to sell chipmaking materials maker JSR to Mitsui Chemicals in a deal that could exceed 1.3 trillion yen ($8.2 billion), after buying it for some 900 billion yen two years ago, taking advantage of higher chip-firm valuations on the artificial intelligence investment boom, according to two people familiar with the matter who spoke to Reuters, in a text republished by DealStreetAsia. Founded in 1957, JSR is a leading manufacturer of photoresists used to transfer circuit patterns onto semiconductor wafers, and Nikkei Asia notes that the sale would be the biggest deal in the history of Japan’s chemical sector.

Asian stocks fell on Wednesday along with the dollar, as Democrats gained in the US midterm elections, gains analysts said could lead to gridlock on Capitol Hill. The Nikkei 225 fell 3.6% to 60,835.36, its lowest level since early May, with SoftBank Group down 8% and Kioxia Holdings down 10.8%. The Kospi fell 3.2% to 5,466.83, with SK Hynix down 3.2% and Samsung Electronics down 1.8%. The dollar fell to 158.06 yen from 158.75 on Tuesday, and the euro rose to US$1.1249. Investors see the Democratic wave bringing tighter regulatory scrutiny, particularly of artificial intelligence companies.

Japan’s defense minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, again called for an open and frank discussion on nuclear weapons in the country, at a symposium in Tokyo, according to the Russian state agency TASS, which cites Kyodo News. “We must create conditions in which the security measures necessary for Japan can be discussed openly and frankly,” he said. The statement comes amid the review of the national security strategy, which also touches on Japan’s three non-nuclear principles: not to possess, produce or introduce nuclear weapons into its territory. Koizumi also once again left the door open to potentially equipping the country’s navy with nuclear submarines.

Japan’s government and ruling coalition are weighing defense spending of 70 trillion to 80 trillion yen (US$457 billion to US$508 billion) over the five years from April 2027, about 1.8 times the 43 trillion yen in the current plan, according to the South China Morning Post (SCMP), which cites sources quoted by Reuters. Some of the money is expected to fund purchases such as large numbers of drones, and a weaker yen has pushed up the cost of procurement, one of the sources said.

Japan launched a new national agency to boost its disaster response. Reconstruction Minister Goshi Hosono, newly named to serve concurrently as disaster management minister, spoke at a press conference at the National Disaster Management Agency in Tokyo on November 2, 2026.

Japan has asked the US for thorough discipline enforcement after Marine Kalvin Montoya Cardona was arrested in Okinawa on suspicion of drunk driving during curfew hours — caught at around 12:25 a.m. on Saturday with twice the legal blood-alcohol limit, according to Kyodo News.

Japanese group GMO Internet suspects that a North Korea-linked hacking group was behind a data leak. The company suspects that the attack targeting users of its foreign exchange service was the work of a North Korea-linked group and reported the case to authorities.

GMO Internet Group CEO Masatoshi Kumagai and other executives will hold a news conference in Tokyo on Monday to address a series of unauthorized access incidents, the company said Saturday, according to The Japan Times. The company will explain the circumstances surrounding a cyberattack on its Onamae.com Desktop Cloud service, which provides servers for automated foreign exchange margin trading.

The foreign ministers of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) announced plans to provide more than $85 million in technical and financial support to improve access to trusted artificial intelligence across the Indo-Pacific, according to the joint statement from the Atlanta meeting. The text also records a US commitment of $10 million to develop facilities in India and in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries to recover critical minerals from waste, according to The Times of India. India’s external affairs minister, S. Jaishankar, said the Quad must safeguard freedom of choice and secure supply chains and tackle non-market practices, without naming any country, and called for a “more contemporary” agenda for the group, with a practical approach.

Quad foreign ministers expressed “grave concerns” over economic coercion, including through arbitrary export restrictions and non-market policies and practices that result in overcapacity and disrupt global supply chains in critical industries, in the joint statement issued after Saturday’s meeting in Atlanta, according to Reuters. The text also emphasized the “absolute necessity to protect and preserve navigational rights and freedoms in the Strait of Hormuz, the Red Sea, and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait”.

The United States, South Korea and Japan reaffirmed their commitment to the “complete denuclearisation” of North Korea at a meeting on Friday on the sidelines of a Group of 20 (G20) foreign ministers’ gathering in Atlanta. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun and Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi pledged full implementation of Security Council resolutions, according to the US State Department.

Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met on Friday in Atlanta on the sidelines of a G20 meeting, and Motegi demanded the immediate release of a Japanese national detained in Russia's Sakhalin region, according to Reuters, in a text republished by the Japan Times. According to TASS, the last time the two countries' foreign ministers held direct face-to-face talks was in September 2021.

Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi demanded on Friday the immediate release of a Japanese national detained in Sakhalin Oblast, according to Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at a meeting of about 30 minutes with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on the sidelines of the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Atlanta, which began at 1:35 p.m. local time. According to Reuters, in a text republished by the WQXC website, Russia said this month it had detained a Japanese journalist in its far eastern Sakhalin region on suspicion of espionage.

The foreign ministers of Japan and Russia met on Friday on the fringes of the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting, according to Kyodo News. It was their first full-fledged talks in five years, according to TASS.

The foreign ministers of South Korea, the United States (US) and Japan will meet in the US on Friday to discuss Korean Peninsula issues, economic security cooperation and the response to Pyongyang, officials cited by Yonhap said — the discussion covers the North's latest missile launches and closer Pyongyang-Beijing ties following Kim Jong-un's recent visit to China. South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun will meet in Atlanta on Friday with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi, the Korea Herald reported, as Seoul seeks to manage sensitive issues in its alliance with Washington.

The United States and Japan agreed to build a final assembly and inspection plant for the Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) in Japan, NPR reported. The announcement was made by Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi at a news conference on Wednesday night in the central Philippine province of Cebu, where he met US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The missiles to be produced under the joint effort called Operation Supercharge are essential for F-35 fighter jets, Koizumi said.

North Korea launched more than 10 short-range ballistic missiles toward the East Sea on Thursday, according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff. The South Korean military said it detected the launches from the Wonsan area at around 12:30 p.m. Japan’s government said the suspected North Korean missile has already fallen, according to Kyodo News.

The defense chiefs of Japan and the United States agreed to boost cooperation against cyberattacks, according to Kyodo News.

Japan's Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi told US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that Japan plans to boost “denial defense”, according to Kyodo News. In the meeting, the two discussed munitions production and the strategy the two governments call “deterrence through denial”, on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) defense chiefs' summit in the Philippines, according to the Japan Times.

Japan and Bangladesh agreed to expand cooperation on supply chains and energy, with projected Japanese private investment of up to one trillion yen in Bangladesh over the next five years expected to create 200,000 jobs, according to The Business Standard. The two prime ministers agreed the initiative integrates the development of power, energy, a deep-sea port, and industrial and information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, the newspaper reported.

The Kadena air base in Okinawa has banned BYD vehicles, including privately owned cars, taxis and delivery vehicles, according to The Guardian. A spokesperson for US forces in Japan said the vehicles present “an unacceptable and unmitigable risk to our personnel and our mission”. In June the Pentagon added BYD to a list of 188 Chinese firms it believes have ties to the military, drawing a protest from Beijing.

The GMO Internet Group called on users to unplug their computers ahead of a threatened midday ransomware attack, according to Kyodo News. The group is investigating a cyberattack on a cloud trading service after the apparent culprit threatened ransomware attacks on user computers, according to Nikkei.

GMO Internet Group chief executive Masatoshi Kumagai admitted on Sunday night that the company's own engineers had flagged security issues before unauthorized access to a foreign exchange trading service it provides and that its response to the concerns was insufficient, Kyodo News reported. Japan's Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and relevant cabinet ministers will meet on Monday evening to discuss cyber security plans, amid data leaks and misuse, the top government spokesman said.

Former Japanese prime minister Yasuo Fukuda died of heart failure at a hospital in Tokyo on October 22 at the age of 90, according to Xinhua, which cited local media. China expressed condolences, and a spokesperson described Fukuda as an old friend of the Chinese people who contributed to the improvement and development of bilateral relations, according to NHK.

The US Air Force combat wing at Kadena Air Base in Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture has banned vehicles made by China’s automaker BYD from the facility over security concerns, Kyodo News reported Monday. “These vehicles present an unacceptable and unmitigable risk to our personnel and our mission,” Kadena Air Base spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Alli Stormer told Reuters, in text republished by eletric-vehicles.com.

Japan is considering including in its revised three key security-related documents plans to study and research the possibility of introducing a nuclear-powered submarine, according to The Japan Times. The Japanese government is considering starting an investigation into whether to acquire nuclear-powered submarines as part of the upcoming regular update to its defense strategy, according to Nikkei Asia.

A United States Marine was indicted over the robbery and murder of a woman in Okinawa, according to Kyodo News.

Japanese carmakers such as Toyota, Honda and Nissan typically spend four to five years developing a new model, more than twice as long as Chinese companies, which take less than two years, according to Kyodo News. Nissan plans to shorten the lead time for developing a new sport-utility vehicle to three years and one month, for launch in North America in 2028.

Japanese parcel delivery company Sagawa Express said up to 53.23 million records containing personal information may have leaked after unauthorized access to its parcel tracking system, according to Xinhua. Potentially compromised data includes names, addresses and telephone numbers of parcel senders and recipients, as well as email addresses registered with its Smart Club membership service, covering shipments from June 21 through Sept. 30. The company said no credit card information or tracking passwords were exposed, and that the figure includes many duplicates and does not represent the number of individuals affected.

Japanese telecommunications carrier KDDI has apologized over a massive wildfire that broke out in a Mongolian nature reserve earlier this month, NHK World reported. Mongolia’s state-run Montsame News Agency reported that the blaze started in the Numrug Strictly Protected Area in the eastern province of Dornod on October 8 and spread to grassland. KDDI has not disclosed details about the fire, but said Mobicom executives, including its Japanese CEO, entered the nature reserve by vehicle to conduct a communications network test.

Japan booked a trade deficit of $17.8 billion (2.82 trillion yen) from April to September, almost double the figure a year earlier, as the Middle East crisis made energy imports far more expensive for a resource-poor G7 economy, according to government data released on Wednesday. The volume of petroleum imports fell 21.2 percent while the value surged 26.3 percent; the volume of petroleum products dropped 26.8 percent and the value rose 23.2 percent.

Vulnerabilities found in the PHP programming language, which is mainly designed for servers, led Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare to temporarily suspend a website for its information disclosure system as a precaution, according to Kyodo News. The site lists contact information and service details of long-term care providers nationwide. The government-affiliated Innovation Platform Agency said patches would be released by the developer later Wednesday. According to a European research organization, PHP is used by 69.3 percent of websites worldwide whose server-side programming language is known.

Russia will respond firmly to a Japanese company's supply of combat drones to Ukraine, Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a news briefing, according to the TASS agency. The agency did not name the company or specify which response is under consideration.

A GMO Internet security subsidiary found six units of attacking devices aimed exclusively at Japanese firms, according to Kyodo News. Its probe indicated that the autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agent Artex was employed in the cyberattacks against Japanese entities.

Japan launched the MMX probe aboard H3 rocket No. 10, with separation and insertion into the planned orbit, according to Kyodo News. The rocket lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center at 4:41 a.m., and the spacecraft will head for Phobos, the larger of Mars’ two moons, with a return to Earth with the samples scheduled for July 2031.

A cross-party group of Japanese lawmakers visited the war-linked Yasukuni shrine, and Japan’s prime minister sent a monetary offering to the same shrine, according to Kyodo News.

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made a ritual offering to the Yasukuni shrine, while four of her Cabinet colleagues, including Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi, visited the site, according to China Daily. Beijing lodged formal protests with Tokyo and described the shrine as “a spiritual tool and symbol of Japanese militarism”. The South China Morning Post reported that China criticized Takaichi over the offering and warned of “remilitarisation”.

Japan’s Self-Defense Forces and the United States military will hold the large-scale joint exercise Keen Sword 27 in various locations across Japan from October 19 to 29, deploying about 45,000 and 12,000 personnel respectively, with Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the Philippines also taking part, according to Xinhua.

South Korea said it is deeply disappointed over Takaichi’s ritual offering to the Yasukuni shrine, according to Kyodo News.

Japan’s economic and fiscal policy minister Kiuchi visited the war-linked Yasukuni shrine, according to Kyodo News. The Japanese government said that whether Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi will visit the shrine during the autumn festival, which starts on the 17th, is a matter for her to judge appropriately, according to SBS.

Japan is increasingly turning to foreign companies to accelerate its military modernization, drawing on overseas technology, expertise and production capacity to plug defense gaps that could prove critical in a potential regional conflict involving China, according to the South China Morning Post (SCMP). Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi confirmed last Friday that Japan had signed a contract to acquire interceptor drones from Ukrainian start-up SkyFall, according to the SCMP.

Okinawa Governor Genta Koja said Friday he accepts the deployment of the American MV-22 Osprey aircraft at Futenma air station, reversing the province historic opposition, according to Kyodo News. Previous prefectural governments had opposed the deployment since before the aircraft were first stationed at the base in 2012 over safety concerns, and Koja took office late last month.

North Korean analyst Pak Ju Won wrote to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) that the US is abetting Japan’s drive toward nuclear armament by supporting Tokyo’s intention to acquire nuclear-powered submarines, with the ultimate goal of creating the conditions to acquire nuclear weapons, according to TASS.

GlobalFoundries will build chip facilities under an investment deal between the United States and Japan, according to Kyodo News. Japan will invest about $21 billion in up to two chip factories in New York, jointly owned by the US government and Japanese interests and operated by GlobalFoundries, according to Reuters, in a text republished by WHTC. The first factory is expected to add annual US manufacturing capacity of about 900,000 300 mm wafers when fully operational, according to the same report.

Senior American diplomats, administration officials and Indo-Pacific military commanders met in Tokyo earlier this month, in a gathering one source called unusual, ahead of President Donald Trump's planned visit to China in November. According to the Chosun Ilbo, observers suggest the meeting aimed to review US strategies toward China and North Korea. On the 8th, senior State Department officials and 10 US ambassadors to Asian countries visited Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where they met Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi.

Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) detained a Hokkaido Shimbun reporter in Sakhalin on suspicion of espionage, according to Jiji Press, in text republished by Nippon.com. The detained man is a Japanese national, a correspondent in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, the capital of the Sakhalin region, and was reported to have been transferred to Moscow. Russia's Foreign Ministry said it regretted that Tokyo was using correspondents to carry out spying, according to Reuters, in text republished by The Japan Times.

Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said a correspondent for the Japanese newspaper Hokkaido Shimbun in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, in the Russian Far East, was detained on suspicion of espionage, transported to Moscow and placed in custody, according to TASS. Moscow's Lefortovsky District Court placed the journalist under arrest under Article 276 of the Criminal Code, which covers espionage.

European states, Canada, Japan and the United Nations (UN) came out in defence of the International Criminal Court (ICC) against United States (US) sanctions, after Washington sanctioned the court itself on Friday. The ICC said the move was an “assault on the rule of law and on the very foundations of the international legal order” and called on its 125 member states to defend the institution. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that Washington would ban transactions with the “rogue court”, cutting off its resources and crippling its ability to operate.

Japan and the United States will rehearse moving anti-ship missiles, air defences and communications networks onto islands near Taiwan this month in an expanded military exercise, the South China Morning Post reported.

US President Donald Trump urged Chinese leader Xi Jinping to repair ties with Japan and lift Beijing’s export curbs on Tokyo during their September talks in Washington, according to Kyodo News, citing the South China Morning Post. Trump said China’s export restrictions on Japan-bound items, including rare earths, pose a “threat to American industries reliant on Japanese suppliers,” and described the move as “an indirect violation of the US-China trade truce” reached in South Korea in October last year. Xi was “not particularly receptive,” saying Beijing’s dispute with Tokyo should be kept separate from the relationship with Washington, and warned of “the growing risks of Japanese militarism.”

Details of the alleged murder by Marine Devin Jacob Ballard, 20, sparked a protest outside the US Embassy in Tokyo, according to CGTN, and US military authorities in Okinawa imposed movement restrictions on their personnel. The victim was identified as Anna Yagi, 39, a local resident of Naha, the prefectural capital, and an autopsy indicated death by strangulation, according to CGTN, citing local police. Benjamin Watson, head of US forces in Japan, ordered on Wednesday a 30-day off-base restriction starting October 9, banning off-base outings between midnight and 5 a.m., according to CGTN. Genta Koja, newly elected governor of Okinawa, announced he would travel to Tokyo on Wednesday to lodge an official protest with the central government, according to CGTN.

Lance Corporal Devin Jacob Ballard, 20, is suspected of killing a 39-year-old woman at a hotel in Naha on Saturday and taking her wallet and backpack, according to Free Malaysia Today. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi registered a formal protest with the United States on Sunday. On Tuesday, around 100 protesters rallied outside the US embassy in Tokyo against violence by American soldiers, according to AFP, in a text republished by TAG24.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Monday that Tokyo's “unfriendly attacks” will not remain without proportionate countermeasures and that Russia will respond to Japan's new anti-Russian steps, according to Sputnik. Last week, Japan imposed new restrictions against Russia, according to the outlet.

Police in Okinawa arrested a US Marine accused of robbing and killing a woman, according to the Associated Press. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said her government protested to the US side and demanded maximum cooperation with Japanese authorities in the investigation, tougher discipline for service members and preventive measures, according to the Associated Press. The arrest sparked growing outrage in Japan, according to Al Jazeera.

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said the country will stay the course of resolving the territorial issue and concluding a peace treaty with Russia despite the difficult state of bilateral relations, according to TASS.

A Marine stationed at Futenma Air Station is suspected of killing a 39-year-old woman in a hotel in Naha on Saturday and taking her wallet and backpack, according to NBC News, citing local police; he was arrested at 1 a.m. Sunday, and the Government of Japan lodged a strong protest with the United States, calling the case brutal and heinous.

A 20-year-old American Marine stationed in Okinawa was arrested on Sunday on suspicion of robbing and murdering a local woman, according to the Times of India. The suspicion involves the death of 39-year-old Anna Yagi and the theft of a wallet and a backpack at a hotel in Naha in the early hours of Saturday. Japan’s foreign ministry said it would lodge a protest with US ambassador George Glass.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said it will take compensatory measures to strengthen its defense capability in response to what it calls Japan's remilitarization, according to Sputnik. Japan announced plans to use Type 25 missile systems, stationed in the country a few months ago, during the joint Japan-US Keen Sword 27 drills scheduled for October, Sputnik reported.

Japan issued an emergency alert on Saturday about the launch of a suspected North Korean ballistic missile, on the day South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the North fired at least one ballistic missile from the Wonsan area, on the peninsula’s eastern coast, towards the sea. The projectile flew more than 700 km, according to the same Joint Chiefs of Staff, cited by the Yonhap news agency.

The joint Keen Sword military exercises, by the US and Japan, will take place from October 19 to 29 in Japan and adjacent waters, with seven other countries taking part, according to the Russian news agency TASS. On the Japanese side, about 45,000 troops, 40 warships and 250 aircraft are taking part, and the size of the US contingent was not disclosed, also according to TASS.

The mayor of Kadena Town in Okinawa Prefecture visited the Japanese Defense Ministry's Okinawa Defense Bureau on Monday to protest the planned storage of the US Typhon mid-range missile system at Kadena Air Base, China Global Television Network (CGTN) reported. According to Japan's Defense Ministry, the US Army will temporarily store the Typhon system and the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) at Kadena Air Base on Okinawa starting in mid-October. The Typhon system includes launchers, missiles and a battery operations center and can fire both SM-6 and Tomahawk missiles.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko said that Russia does not trust Japan’s promises to remove US missile systems after the joint military drills are over and warned that such actions will not go unanswered, according to TASS. In an interview with the Izvestia daily, Rudenko said the Japanese authorities promised that the missiles would supposedly be removed after the drills ended. According to earlier reports, US forces were set to deploy on Kyushu Typhon ground-based systems, designed to launch intermediate- and shorter-range missiles, along with HIMARS launchers, during drills held from June to September.

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul met Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at the UN amid worsening ties and fresh security tensions, according to DW. Lavrov made clear that Russia will veto any attempt by Germany and Japan to obtain permanent seats on the Security Council, according to AP.

The Typhon missile systems will stay in Japan after the exercises. According to the Russian agency TASS, Japan’s Defense Ministry said the Typhon systems deployed at Kanoya air field in Kagoshima Prefecture during the June and September exercises will be transferred to storage at Kadena air force base in Okinawa by mid-October, aboard C-17 transport aircraft. The ministry said the American side explained that storing the equipment at Kadena is not a permanent deployment in Japan. For the Daily Sun, the longer Typhon presence in the country creates a distributed network of strike, air-defence and targeting capabilities that complicates Chinese military operations around Taiwan.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko said relations between Russia and Japan keep deteriorating severely, with contacts limited to isolated matters, and placed the initiative to normalize the situation with Tokyo, in an interview with TASS.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi used her first address to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Tuesday, 22 September 2026, to call for an overhaul of the organization, including the removal of a 1940s-era clause that refers to Japan as an “enemy state” and that China has invoked in its row with Tokyo, according to The Japan Times. Takaichi said the UN has “never been more important” and “must be reborn as a ‘more resilient and effective United Nations’” to regain the trust of the international community, 70 years after Japan’s admission in 1956. In a meeting with Secretary-General António Guterres, she raised Security Council reform, according to the official UN readout carried by IANS. Japan is part of the Group of Four (G4) with Brazil, Germany and India, which back each other’s bids for permanent seats on an expanded Council.

Typhoon Dujuan killed four people and left six others missing in eastern Japan, in the prefectures of Chiba and Kanagawa, and injured 22, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency (FDMA) of Japan, cited by The Japan Times and Jiji Press. Chiba recorded three of the deaths. The typhoon, Japan’s 25th this year, cut power to tens of thousands of homes and forced more than 1.6 million people in the Tokyo area to leave at-risk areas, BBC News reported. The storm also brought record rainfall: Oshima island recorded 832 millimetres over 48 hours, more than double its average rainfall for the whole of September, according to Japanese public broadcaster NHK. Japan’s meteorological agency lifted or downgraded most heavy rain and landslide warnings on Tuesday.

Typhoon Dujuan left at least four people dead and 22 injured in Japan, the Fire and Disaster Management Agency (FDMA) said, cited by Agence France-Presse on Tuesday, September 22: three deaths in Chiba prefecture and one in Kanagawa, both near Tokyo. Searches for six people missing after landslides continued on Tuesday morning. More than 45,000 households in Chiba were still without power and 460 houses were damaged. The death toll, put at two on the night of Monday, September 21, rose as rescue teams advanced. The storm moved away from the coast and out into the Pacific on Tuesday morning, prompting the Japan Meteorological Agency to lift or downgrade most heavy rain and landslide warnings. Oshima island recorded 832 millimetres of rain in 48 hours, more than double its average for the whole of September, public broadcaster NHK reported, and Tokyo’s Edogawa ward logged a local record of 282.5 millimetres in 24 hours. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi delayed her departure for New York by about four hours and arrived late on Monday, Kyodo reported; she is due to meet Donald Trump on Tuesday.

Typhoon Dujuan has killed two people in Japan, in landslides in Chiba and Kanagawa prefectures, according to local governments cited by Japanese media, including the Kyodo news agency, and by Agence France-Presse (AFP). Early on Tuesday the storm had moved away from the coast and was heading northeast out to sea with weaker winds, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). Japan Airlines cancelled 135 flights and All Nippon Airways (ANA) cancelled 140, and more than 9,000 households near Tokyo lost power, according to AFP. The rain forced the early closure of the Tokyo Game Show, one of the world’s biggest video-game trade fairs, on Monday, its final day, and led to the cancellation of a music festival and a baseball game in Chiba.