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TOKYO - The following is the latest list of selected news summaries by Kyodo News. TOKYO - Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said Friday that a Taiwan emergency involving the use of military force could constitute a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan under the country's security legislation. Her remarks suggested Japan could exercise the right of collective self-defense if such a situation is recognized as "survival-threatening," even under the nation's war-renouncing Constitution, in a move that would provoke China, which claims the self-ruled island as its territory. TOKYO - Japan has resumed seafood shipments to China for the first time since Beijing banned imports in 2023 over the release into the sea of treated radioactive wastewater from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power plant, the government said Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told a press conference that the government takes it "positively" that six tons of frozen scallops from Japan's northern main island of Hokkaido were shipped to China on Wednesday. TOKYO - North Korea launched a ballistic missile Friday that apparently fell outside Japan's exclusive economic zone, the Japanese government said, warning of the possibility of further provocations from Pyongyang. The missile, the second of its kind to be launched since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi took office on Oct. 21, was fired at around 12:34 p.m. eastward from North Korea's west coast and flew more than 450 kilometers at an altitude of up to 50 km, the Defense Ministry said. PM Takaichi says Japan to reconsider single-year fiscal discipline goal TOKYO - Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said Friday the government will reconsider its current single-year fiscal discipline target, in a warning sign that her expansionary fiscal policy could further worsen the cash-strapped condition of Japan's public finances. Takaichi, who took office on Oct. 21 and is widely viewed as a fiscal dove, said at a parliamentary session that she will not stick to the commitment to achieve an annual surplus of the "primary balance" -- tax and other revenues minus spending except for debt-servicing costs -- within fiscal 2026, which ends in March 2027. Honda cuts FY 2025 net profit outlook to 300 bil. yen on chip shortage TOKYO - Honda Motor Co. said Friday it has slashed its full-year net profit outlook to 300 billion yen ($1.95 billion) from the previously projected 420 billion yen, with a semiconductor shortage dragging down the Japanese automaker's global output estimate. The revised forecast represents a 64.1 percent year-on-year fall in net profit for the current business year through March, hit by a halt in semiconductor shipments from Chinese-owned, Netherlands-based Nexperia, which is mired in a trade row between China and the Netherlands. Japan's Motegi to attend G7 foreign ministerial meeting in Canada TOKYO - Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said Friday that he is slated to make a three-day visit to Canada next week to attend a meeting of foreign ministers from the Group of Seven major economies. The main topics of the two-day meeting in Ontario's Niagara region, beginning Tuesday, are expected to include support for war-torn Ukraine and the situation in Gaza, the Foreign Ministry said. Motegi is scheduled to return to Japan on Thursday. Japan listed firms to see 1st profit drop in 6 yrs amid U.S. tariffs: tally TOKYO - Listed companies in Japan are projected to post a combined 7.8 percent year-on-year net profit decline for fiscal 2025, as higher U.S. tariffs weigh particularly on automakers and other manufacturers, a securities firm said Friday. If realized, this would mark the first profit drop in six years, with nonmanufacturers like shipping and retail also seeing notable declines, according to SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. KADOMA, Japan - Two-time defending champion Yuma Kagiyama topped the men's singles short program Friday on the opening day of the NHK Trophy, the fourth stop of the figure skating Grand Prix series. The Beijing Winter Olympic silver medalist scored 98.58 to place first in the segment ahead of countryman Shun Sato on 96.67 and South Korea's Cha Jun Hwan on 91.60 at Towa Pharmaceutical RACTAB Dome in Osaka Prefecture. VIDEO: Japan jerseys for 2026 World Cup unveiled
