Japanese authorities yesterday declared the cherry blossom season open in Tokyo, with the blooming date moving forward because of what some experts say is the effect of global warming.
Millions of Japanese wine and dine each year at parties under the cherry trees, whose delicate but short-lived blossoms have left centuries worth of poets pondering the ephemeral nature of beauty.
A meteorological agency official confirmed that more than 10 buds on a designated Somei-Yoshino cherry tree planted in the grounds of Yasukuni shrine in central Tokyo came into bloom yesterday morning.
PHOTO: AFP
The officially declared blooming date in the capital came earlier than average for the fourth consecutive year, the agency said.
“A rise in temperatures is one of the key elements prompting cherry trees to bloom,” another agency official said. “The early blooming could be affected by global warming, but we need more study to probe it.”
Researchers at Kyushu University have predicted that global warming would prompt cherry trees to bloom in northern Japan more than three weeks earlier than average by the end of this century, the Mainichi Shimbun reported.
“The results showed climate change can also affect our familiar events such as cherry blossom,” Hisanori Ito, a meteorologist at the western Japanese university, told the daily. “Global warming is an imminent problem.”
The closely watched announcement made the headlines with Japanese television networks showing footage of white and pink blossoms swaying gently under the spring sunshine.
Mapping the location of the cherry-blossom front, which moves northeast along the Japanese archipelago, is a key duty for the meteorological agency in March and April.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not