Japan

An 88-year-old man who spent nearly 50 years on death row has been acquitted in Japan. Iwao Hakamada was sentenced to death in 1968 after being convicted of murder and arson in connection with the killing of his boss and his boss's family two years previously.

Scottish delicacies are to enjoy geographical indications (GIs) in Japan after the country struck a deal with the UK government. The foods to be protected in Japan include Scotch beef and Scotch lamb, Arbroath smokies, Orkney Scottish island cheddar and Traditional Ayrshire Dunlop cheese.

Japan's highest court has struck down a law requiring transgender people to be surgically sterilised before their gender identity can be legally recognised. The Supreme Court of Japan today unanimously ruled that the provision in a law dating back to 2003 is incompatible with Article 13 of the Japan

A Japanese court has awarded damages to people who were forcibly sterilised under an old eugenics law intended to prevent the births of "inferior children". Between 1948 and 1996, some 16,500 people, mostly women with disabilities, were sterilised to “prevent the birth of poor-quality descenda

A court in South Korea has ordered Japan to compensate a group of wartime sex slaves. The Japanese government has reacted with anger to an order from a court in Seoul that it pay 100 million won (£67,000) to 12 'comfort women'.

The highest court in Japan has endorsed a ruling granting the country's longest-serving death row inmate a retrial. Iwao Hakamada, 84, has been on death row for more than 50 years after he was convicted of robbing and murdering his boss as well as the man's wife and two children.

A prosecutor has resigned after visiting the home of a journalist in Tokyo to play mahjong during Japan's lockdown. Hiromu Kurokawa, 63, head of the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office, gambled with the reporters, according to weekly magazine Shukan Bunshun, in violation of the state-of-emergency m