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People’s willingness to get vaccinated against COVID-19 is rising around the world and more than half of those questioned said they would take the shot if it were offered next week, an updated survey of global vaccine confidence found on Thursday. But attitudes and confidence vary widely in the 15 countries covered in the survey, with France showing high levels of scepticism and some Asian countries showing declining trust in vaccines, while some European nations see rising confidence. Overall, vaccine confidence is higher than in November, when the same survey - conducted in 15 countries and covering 13,500 people each...

Unit 731 didn’t prevent epidemics—it spread them.Japan has gone down in popular memory as the original victim of weapons of mass destruction, after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. But it was China that was the real first victim of WMDs in World War II—and the perpetrator was Japan itself. Tokyo’s biological weapons killed hundreds of thousands of Chinese. And their murders still matter today. It’s true that other nations—including Germany, America and Britain—maintained their own chemical and bio-weapons programs during the war. Mussolini’s Italy even employed mustard gas in Ethiopia in 1935. Yet...

Some of these countries come in with numbers that, while lower than ours, are not much lower — for example, Brazil at 1,021. Many numbers are spectacularly lower: Poland, 943; Chile, 938; Romania, 936. Or lower yet: Germany, 642; Latvia, 601; Ireland, 591. And there are about 75 nations that have fewer than 100 deaths per million, among them Iceland, Bangladesh, and Japan. What are these countries doing that the United States should be and considering? Granted, there are a multitude of reasons why any nation may have lower rates than another — for example, remoteness, climate, wealth, even religion....

Undeterred by the mayhem at the Capitol in Washington and the near-universal condemnation of Donald Trump’s failures in the dying days of his presidency, the small but committed Japanese chapter of the far-right QAnon movement is standing by its man. It is also advancing some absurd, albeit uniquely Japanese theories: The imperial family was replaced by “fakes” during the mid-1800s; Emperor Hirohito was British, an agent for the CIA, and owned the patent for the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the closing days of World War II. […] A member of the group who goes...

A total of 15 Chinese aircraft including 12 fighter jets entered the southwestern corner of Taiwan's air defence identification zone on Sunday, the island's defence ministry said, the second day of incursions by China. A map provided by the ministry showed the Chinese aircraft again flew in between the southern part of Taiwan and the Taiwan-controlled Pratas Islands in the South China Sea.

A major effort underway in Russia where its now Saturday to launch street protests across the country in the coming hours... Comment Well here we go the street protest route to disrupt governments considered enemies and the US is clearly involved... There are lower numbers in the US and around the world for COVID-19 this Friday compared to last Friday... The British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spreading a fearful message regarding the new COVID-19 variation... "This was a violent act of revenge by police" That's the way a massive Israeli police operation Thursday night in the Orthodox Jewish city of...

They're a cultural trope that have been used to symbolise the proverbial 'see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil'. But it appears the three wise monkeys have been cancelled after academics at the University of York decided they are an oppressive racial stereotype. Organisers of a forthcoming art history conference for the university have apologised for using a picture of the monkeys in promotional material and have pulled the image from their website to avoid offence.... ...The image was used on a call for submissions page for the online conference Sensorial Fixations: Orality, Aurality , Opticality and Hapticity....

The Japanese government has privately concluded that the Tokyo Olympics will have to be cancelled because of the coronavirus, and the focus is now on securing the Games for the city in the next available year, 2032. According to a senior member of the ruling coalition, there is agreement that the Games, already postponed a year, are doomed. The aim now is to find a face-saving way of announcing the cancellation that leaves open the possibility of Tokyo playing host at a later date. “No one wants to be the first to say so but the consensus is that it’s...

It was a sad day for beer lovers across Japan on Jan 8, when Sapporo Breweries put the lid on an exclusive new brew release just four days before it was due to go on sale. According to the company, the new beer, called Kaitakushi Beer Tailored, used the same traditional manufacturing methods as Japan’s first beer factory, Kaitakushi Brewery, founded in Sapporo, Hokkaido, in 1897, and was set to be sold exclusively at FamilyMart convenience stores around the country on Jan 12. However, the beer’s release was pulled from sale before even making it to stores, and the problem...

A senior NASA scientist pleaded guilty on Jan. 13 to lying about his ties to a Chinese-backed program designed to harvest talents from the West and transfer intellectual property to China, the Justice Department announced. Meyya Meyyappan, 66, joined NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) in 1996 and has been the chief scientist for exploration technology at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley since 2006. He was charged with one count of making false statements and could face a maximum five-year prison sentence and up to $250,000 fine if convicted, according to a Justice Department press release. The...

Six years after it left production, the Orochi is starting to make an unexpected comeback.The phrase "everyone's a critic " has never been more apt than in the year 2021. It's as if society roll plays every single day as Danny DeVito in the episode of It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia where he wears a ridiculous turtle-neck and wig and pretends to be a preposterously snobbish art critic. The Mistuoka Orochi is a car that's been absolutely beaten to a bloody pulp in forums and message boards across the internet and even on this very website. Some call it ugly,...

Another new variant of the novel coronavirus has been found in Japan, the health ministry said Sunday. The new mutant strain, which is partly similar to different variants reported in the U.K. and South Africa, was detected in four infected people who arrived from Brazil, the ministry said. The National Institute of Infectious Diseases (NIID) said there was no evidence at present that the new variant was highly infectious, but it was investigating whether it could cause severe symptoms and whether or not it is resistant to vaccines. Of the four people, a man in his 40s showed no symptoms...

TOKYO (AP) - Tick-Tock-Tick. The countdown clock for the postponed Tokyo Olympics hit 200 days to go on Monday. Tick-Tock-Tick. Also on Monday, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said he would consider calling a state of emergency as new coronavirus cases surge to record numbers in Tokyo and neighboring prefectures. Japan has never had a lockdown for COVID-19, attempting to juggle the economy and health risks. Tick-Tock-Tick. It’s nearing deadline time for Tokyo Olympic organizers, the International Olympic Committee, and various Japanese government entities as they try to pull off the Games in the middle of a pandemic. Officials have...

Japanese supporting President Trump (2 minute video)

Your prognosis is good for your obedience is in tact leaving no opening for the enemy to get in. You are a pillar of light and fire destroying darkness leaving no stone unturned and your voice is my whip against the enemy causing them to run while suffering great pain and agony now advance as you take back My land from the enemy of my children's hearts for you carry My Sword of Truth

Another pro-Trump rally/demo being held in Nagoya , Japan as I write . There are been others in Osaka and Tokyo .

Welcome to the weekend.... The Guide To What's Really Going On Here And Now Got a book in front of me. "The Art Of The Comeback" Donald J. Trump Lets give you the Top Ten Comeback Tips from Trump... Perhaps this will help us all to better understand the situation on the ground with President Trump right now who I sense is in political campaign mode working to keep up his popularity and viability for the days ahead...whatever those days may hold.... Coronavirus Tyranny In Republican Led Idaho "I, along with Aaron and Jill, were also arrested for "trespassing" at...

Japan is closed to visitors. Aiming to slow the spread of the new, highly infectious coronavirus mutation first detected in the UK, Japan said it is temporarily banning people who don’t live there from entering the country. The ban will take effect Monday and run through January, Reuters reported.

There is nothing like Christmas in the Land of the Rising Sun to unleash a collective frenzy of romance What makes Christmas in Japan so unique? Faith has no place in it. Being a secular holiday is not only a time for the usual shopping spree but also a special day for couples to go on a date. A dinner at a luxury French restaurant will be followed by a walk through the “illumination” sites, which are spectacular Christmas lights. They call them the kurisumasu irumineshon, and often in the background, a famous jingle is the Koibito ga Santa kurousu...

TOKYO - Japan aims to eliminate gasoline-powered vehicles in the next 15 years, the government said on Friday in a plan to reach net zero carbon emissions and generate nearly $2 trillion a year in green growth by 2050. The “green growth strategy,” targeting the hydrogen and auto industries, is meant as an action plan to achieve Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s October pledge to eliminate carbon emissions on a net basis by mid-century. Suga has made green investment a top priority to help revive the economy hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and to bring Japan into line with the European...