The top or most interesting stories from Japan for January 19.
– Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, is currently undergoing a week long tour of the Middle East, mainly talking terrorism.
Abe has pledged around ¥294 billion (approx. USD$2.6 billion) in government loans or finance for non-military assets to nations fighting Islamic State to “help build their human capacities, infrastructure, and so on”. (The Japan Times, The Japan News)
He has offered Egypt ¥43 billion (approx. USD$360 million) in loans to combat terrorism and ISIS. Abe has asked the Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to visit Japan by the year’s end. Abe has also offered the Jordanian government ¥12 billion (approx. USD$100 million) in loans.
In Israel, Abe meet with President Benjamin Netanyahu, where the two leaders vowed for both countries to work together against terrorism across the globe.
– A series of avalanches in skiing hot spots across Japan have claimed the lives of four people, including two Japanese and two Argentinian tourists.
– The Japan Times‘ Reiji Yoshida looks at the incredible stealth technology in Japan’s Soryu class submarines, which the Australian government is looking to buy.
– Due to the weaker yen, Japanese companies may bring production back to Japan moving away from countries like China, a process the Wall Street Journal‘s Japan Real Time blog dubs ‘reshoring‘, arguing it could only be good for the country’s economy.
– Rice produced in Fukushima in 2014 all cleared Japan’s food sanitation laws which includes minimums on the allowed radiation. Interestingly though, the failure thresholds have been lowered each year since 2011.
– For one of those real, ‘only in Japan’-esque stories: Tokyo police have started giving out playing cards featuring police dogs from the city’s K-9 unit. The card’s feature slogans like “No! to Dangerous Drugs”.
