Overview
- Okinawa lawmakers pressed officials over a Henoko capsizing that killed two people including a high-school student, and the prefecture said it failed to pre-check the school’s peace-learning outing because it was arranged directly with a citizen group rather than a travel agency.
- The prefecture said it will publish new tourist and school-trip safety steps before Golden Week, the operator’s organizing council asked to apologize directly to families and the school, and Governor Denny Tamaki said he will visit the site to pay respects.
- In the Shiretoko tour-boat case from 2022, prosecutors in Kushiro asked for a five-year sentence for company president Seichi Katsurada after bereaved relatives told the court he must face the weight of his actions.
- At the Kochi District Court, a former Tosashimizu mayor and a former city councilor admitted leaking a public-works bid’s minimum price, with prosecutors seeking prison terms and the court scheduling a June 3 verdict.
- Charging documents say the ex-mayor phoned the minimum price to the ex-councilor, who relayed it to a contractor that won with a 59.13 million yen offer, only 10,000 yen above the threshold, illustrating how a single leak can steer a supposedly competitive bid.