TOKYO – Japan saw a sharp rise in Filipino tourist arrivals in April, with an estimated 91,000 visitors from the Philippines recorded during the month, up 32.8 percent from a year ago, according to preliminary data from the Japan National Tourism Organization.

TOKYO – Tom Cruise had returned to Japan for the 25th time, not just as a global superstar but as a storyteller bringing closure to a franchise three decades in the making.

TOKYO – The foreign ministers of Japan and the Philippines on Tuesday reaffirmed their commitment to supporting second-generation Nikkei-jin in the Southeast Asian country seeking to acquire Japanese nationality.

TOKYO/MANILA – Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, a 69-year-old native of Chicago, was elected as the 267th pope of the Roman Catholic Church on May 8, making history as the first American to assume the papacy. He has taken the name Pope Leo XIV.