http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstCategory/index.php?cmenuid=44 Kyodo News on the Web: Daily international, Japan news, Japan News, national and local news coverage from the newspaper, breaking news updates, technology news, sports, reviews, listings. Kyodo News (C) All Rights Reserved http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstCategory/index.php?cmenuid=44 en http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=490036 The Japan Coast Guard on Thursday obtained an arrest warrant for a member of antiwhaling group the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society on suspicion of trespassing on a vessel of Japan's whaling fleet in the Antarctic Ocean last month. The New Zealand national has been detained on the Shonan Maru No. 2 and will be arrested after the ship arrives in Tokyo on Friday morning in what the Coast Guard said is its first case involving trespassing on a ship in international waters. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489962 The predator responsible for the fatal attacks on crested ibises placed in a protective program in Niigata Prefecture has proven to be a marten, the Environment Ministry said Thursday. Investigators found footprints of a marten left on the surface of the snow leading to the cage at the Sado Japanese Crested Ibis Conservation Center, where nine ibises were found dead Wednesday with another critically injured. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489958 The owner and chef of a high-end sushi restaurant in Santa Monica, California, are facing criminal charges for allegedly serving illegal whale meat, local reports said Wednesday. Staff members who worked on U.S. film ''The Cove,'' which won the Oscar for best documentary Sunday by shooting a controversial dolphin hunt at a Japanese town partly with hidden cameras, tipped off local authorities after visiting The Hump restaurant last year, secretly filming the meat in a $600 meal they ordered and pocketing samples, according to U.S. media. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489930 The Japanese government has suspended the import of about 2,200 tons of farmed Atlantic bluefin tuna due to flaws in documents relating to the catch, in the first such action under an international scheme designed to block the illegal catch and trade of the fish, official sources said Thursday. The move may be used by both advocates of a proposed ban on trade in bluefin tuna in the Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea and the Japanese Fisheries Agency opposed to the proposal when signatory states of the so-called Washington Convention meet in Qatar from Saturday. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489871 Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi on Wednesday installed a robotic arm outside the country's Kibo laboratory module on the International Space Station, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency said. Working together with NASA astronaut Timothy Creamer, the 44-year-old Noguchi opened the air lock for the first time, brought out the 2.2 meter-long arm into space and attached it at the tip of a longer, 10-meter arm. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489862 A new fund is being planned to draw support from businesses using animals and plants for their corporate logos and trademarks in efforts to save endangered species, organizers said Wednesday. The US$10 million fund is planned by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, comprising government and nongovernment entities in over 160 countries, and partly financed by the Global environment Facility, which unites nearly 180 member governments to address global environmental issues, they said. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489861 Thai Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij said Wednesday he is ready to answer questions about the country's investment conditions from Japanese investors when he visits Japan for three days from Friday. Korn, whose 15-delegate mission includes the governor of the Thai central bank and representatives of the Thai private sector, said he will address issues related to Thailand's Map Ta Phut industrial zone ''in a straight forward manner.'' http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489858 Nine crested ibises have died and one remains critically injured at the Sado Japanese Crested Ibis Conservation Center in Sado, Niigata Prefecture, after being attacked in their enclosure apparently by an outside predator, the Environment Ministry said Wednesday. The 10 were in a program for release into the wild in September, along with another female ibis that was unharmed. Two male and seven female ibises were killed and a male was severely injured. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489838 Signs of the full-blown spring season were observed in Japan when cherry blossoms bloomed Wednesday in the western city of Kochi, coming out the earliest in any location other than Okinawa and nearby southern islands, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. The ''someiyoshino'' cherry blossoms in Kochi came out six days earlier than the previous year and tied the record for the earliest blooming on Japan's main islands, which was registered three times in the past -- in Kagoshima Prefecture in 1955 and 1973 and in Wakayama Prefecture in 1959. http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=489804 Eight crested ibises were killed and two critically injured at the Sado Japanese Crested Ibis Conservation Center in Sado, Niigata Prefecture, attacked in their cage apparently by outside predators, the Environment Ministry said Wednesday. The 10 were in a program to release them into the wild in September, together with another ibis that was unharmed.