Some news/links for this morning:

-Japan’s outspoken defence minister, Fumio Kyuma, said on Monday he would avoid paying his respects at Tokyo’s Yasukuni shrine as long as World War Two prime minister Hideki Tojo was honored there. ‘It is difficult for me to bow my head there when Tojo, the man primarily responsible for the last war, is enshrined there,’ Kyuma told Reuters in an interview at the huge Defence Agency compound in central Tokyo.

-A norovirus is sweeping Japan, and even figure skaters are not safe! Watch out!

-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe marked the 50th anniversary on Monday of Japan’s admission to the United Nations by calling for a permanent seat on the Security Council. Despite being the world’s second-largest economy, Japan has failed so far to win enough global support for its bid for a council seat. China, which has had rocky relations with Japan in recent years, has opposed Tokyo’s proposal.

-Four Chinese men in their 20s have been arrested on suspicion of confinement resulting in death of a Chinese student in April in Ikebukuro, Tokyo. The four arrested allegedly belonged to a group that tampered with pachinko machines to generate jackpots. The police also suspect the group was responsible for a spate of thefts in the metropolitan area.

-Japanese officials have denied Pyongyang’s allegation that Japan had kidnapped a North Korean, saying the claim will not affect Tokyo’s plan to press the North over its abductions of Japanese citizens.

-It has been revealead that Resona Bank increased its loans tenfold to the ruling Liberal Democratic Party after the bank came under government control and received 2 trillion yen in taxpayers’ money to resolve its bad-debt problem.

Nihon Keizai Shimbun announced that it will change its English name to the Nikkei Inc. — the abbreviated form which also gives its name to Tokyo’s key stock index. “Probably it’s too difficult for foreigners to pronounce the long syllables of ‘the Nihon Keizai Shimbun’,” explained company spokesman Seiichiro Mishina. [via FG]

-Japan and China have each appointed a 10-member team to kick off joint history research next week, with the Japanese side headed by former U.N. ambassador Shinichi Kitaoka and the Chinese side by modern history scholar Bu Ping. The two teams, comprising experts in history, international politics and diplomacy, will hold their first meeting in Beijing on Dec 26-27 for discussions on bilateral history, with the hopes of better mutual understanding between the two countries that have often been at odds especially over their interpretations on recent war history.

-Nippon Flour Mills has developed sweet wheat, a hybridized variety of wheat with twice the sugar concentration of common wheat.

-The story of Masabumi Hosono, a Japanese man who survived the Titanic disaster only to suffer ostracism at home.

-Photographer Misty Keasler’s book Love Hotels documents the curious, strange, and kinky theme rooms inside the Japanese hotels that are usually rented for short times and a very specific purpose.

-Finally, a rap-while-you-drive steering wheel beat box!

Afternoon update:

-An unemployed Japanese man in Aichi prefecture has been arrested after he visited a police station and confessed that he had just strangled his live-in Filipina girlfriend.

-A public junior high school in Kitami, Hokkaido, closed today due to a suspected outbreak of norovirus, officials of the city education board said. Fifty-eight of the school’s 416 students and one teacher have reported symptoms such as vomiting and abdominal pain since Saturday, officials said. On Monday, 35 students and the teacher were absent from school while 23 students left school early with the symptoms.

-An in-depth summary of the latest Japan news from Trans-Pacific Radio.

-Patrick Macias takes us on a tour of the wacky world of pachinko, with tons of pictures!

-The release of Blue Dragon, a game that Japanese fans are actually interested in, has caused Xbox 360 sales to surge in Japan. I even heard some kids talking about wanting an xbox yesterday!

-Japan Visitor checks out the Yasukuni Shrine and hears some shamisen music.

-TIME Magazine has declared that the Playstation 3 is a bust.

Pokemon + Kim Jong-Il + Pikachu + Nuclear rockets?

-Justin discusses Yasunari Kawabata’s “The Master of Go.”

-Christmas cake, anyone?