Japanese police seek info on French woman who vanished 7 years ago
Officers distributed flyers around Tobu Nikko Station and JR Nikko Station in Tochigi Prefecture, seeking details on the whereabouts of Tiphaine Veron after she went missing on July 29, 2018, at the age of 36.
"I am grateful that the police are distributing flyers," said Veron's brother Damien, 45, who also took part in handing them out. "I want the investigation to continue and for her to be found."
According to police, Veron went missing a day after checking in at her accommodation in Nikko, leaving her luggage and passport in her room.
The flyers were handed out in Japanese, French, English and Chinese.
"We hope that the flyers will spark interest," said Miko Obuchi, an official the Tochigi prefectural police. "The number of tips we receive has been decreasing every year, so we want everyone to check their smartphones for any photos that might provide clues about Ms. Veron."
She is about 165 centimeters in height with brown hair.
Information can be provided to the Nikko Police Station at 0288-53-0110.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
an hour ago
Chanoma: Meticulous Japanese Sweets in a Green Ikebukuro Oasis
Just a few minutes from the bustle of Ikebukuro Station's West Exit, and a single turn into one of the narrow streets spreading through Ikebukuro, I find myself stopping short. Nestled among the towering buildings is a verdant, tree-filled garden hiding a café in an old, traditional-style house. The single-story wooden structure, embraced in a quiet like something from another time, is around 80 years old, and greets every new customer with this feeling of charming discovery. The house itself was built by the owner Fukano Hiroyuki's grandfather after World War II, and his family has lived in this area since the Edo period (1603–1868). The wooden gate at the cafe entrance is a precious piece of architecture dating back to the mid- to late-nineteenth century, meaning it has survived both the Great Kantō Earthquake and the firebombing of World War II. A step through that gate takes me into the cafe area. The wooden gate's jutting roof is a clear landmark. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) The first sight inside is a doma —a feature of older houses, a large, dirt-floored workroom inside the main entrance—lined with tables and benches. Stepping up into the house, where Fukano once actually lived, gives access to washitsu rooms with tatami mats and a covered exterior walkway, or engawa . The doma is bright and airy. A tatami-floored washitsu can be seen to the right. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) Both spaces, the doma and washitsu , are now open to café customers, and feature large windows looking out onto the green garden outside. Stay in the doma to enjoy light filtering through the trees, or take off your shoes and step into washitsu for a taste of the cool shadows of a traditional Japanese house. Sun or shade—let your mood decide which suits you best that day. The floor seating in the Japanese room is perfect for stretching out and relaxing. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) The washitsu rooms take advantage of carefully preserved original fixtures, like fusuma sliding doors decorated with patterns of golden clouds and ume blossoms, and shōji screens with glass panels at the bottom for gazing out at the snow in winter. One room has a tokonoma alcove and a fireplace. Formerly the house tearoom, this space eschews gaudy decoration in favor of a more reserved, calming atmosphere. The tokonoma is decorated with hanging scrolls and ikebana . (© Kawaguchi Yōko) Focus on Ingredients At Chanoma, customers order their drinks and sweets at the counter. The cafe's most popular dish by far is the Nōkō Matcha Terrine. It uses tea from venerable Aoiseicha, a tea shop in Nishio, Aichi Prefecture, packing it with the rich flavor of matcha. It is topped with whipped cream flavored with smoked hōjicha , a form of roasted tea, for a taste treat that balances depth with gentle enjoyment. The popular Nōkō Matcha Terrine and Hōjicha Latte. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) I particularly recommend pairing it with the Hōjicha Latte, which balances the natural sweetness of milk and roasted hōjicha tea. Shop manager Katō Hiroshi says, with a grin, 'We use hōjicha roasted from first-pick tea, so the leaves are packed with umami and sweetness. We want customers to enjoy the natural flavor of the ingredients.' The hot drink is great, of course, but in summer the iced version is also a real treat. Nishi Ike Valley—A New Community Under the High Rises Chanoma opened in December 2021. 'I want to build relationships with people whose faces I know. I want to open up this space to the community and make it somewhere people can mingle,' reflects Fukano. That is what drove his efforts in redeveloping the land he owned and encouraging shops, like Chanoma, to open here. He has grown this hidden residential neighborhood into a greenery-wrapped, welcoming commercial complex called Nishi Ike Valley. What makes this Ikebukuro spot a 'valley?' That name stems from the contrast between the towering high rises lining the main street in front of Ikebukuro Station and the many lower-stature structures in this area, like a green valley between the mountainous buildings. It also reflects his desire to see this a place where many branching 'tributaries' flow together to become one stream uniting diverse people and facilities to create something new. This cafe in a green urban valley between the buildings is truly an oasis of the metropolis. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) Chanoma's design was done by Sudō Tsuyoshi's design studio. The general concept was one of gently tying together the physical space, so they removed the wall that once stood round the garden. They also removed some of the paving on the grounds to replant shrubbery there. That helps blur the borders with the outside to create a more comfortable, half-indoor, half-outdoor environment. A place where visitors can feel free to find their own way of being in the space—that is the true charm of Nishi Ike Valley. The 2023 Nishi Ike Valley fair, held in the parking lot across from Chanoma, attracted over 200 children to enjoy festival games, street stall food, and shaved ice. Other events, like Nishi Ike Valley Day, include market stalls selling food made in the facility's shared kitchen and other offers of casual fun. On an earlier interview done a few years ago, Fukano shared a clear hope: 'I want to see people living in the buildings alongside us to come down and have fun on the street, and to hear the voices of children.' In May 2025, construction finished on a new residential building within the Nishi Ike Valley grounds. The first floor already has tenants like restaurants, a gym, and a work-share space. With this new public living space, connecting residents with those who come for fun, the day when that dream comes true seems close at hand. A Garden for All Seasons Chanoma was the first business to open here, becoming the nucleus for the Nishi Ike Valley project and an object of curiosity from many. Rather than being a perfectly polished commercial facility, it embodies the Nishi Ike Valley concept of 'A house in town to enjoy the spaces between.' In the garden, spring sees the blossoming of cherries, and the ume begin to ripen in early summer. Autumn is when the chestnuts and yuzu appear. When planting the garden, Fukano says, 'We focused on things that bear fruit, that lose their leaves in autumn, and that attract butterflies to lay their eggs.' There are gardeners to care for the trees, people to water the plants early in the morning, and those who come to sweep the leaves from the streets. This garden itself calls for many hands to tend it, and so has formed its own small community. 'It feels good to me to work in this environment. Watering the plants every day helps me see up close the vitality of these plants and feel the changing of the seasons,' says Katō. Once, some visitors from overseas staying at a hotel in Ikebukuro came to Chanoma three days in a row. They brought different friends every day, and apparently explained to each that visiting the cafe was their new morning ritual. The Japanese-style atmosphere seems to charm visitors from overseas. (© Kawaguchi Yōko) If you want a quiet time to visit, avoid the weekends and come on a weekday morning. The scenery around Chanoma offers new flowers and fruit with every season. It is a place that makes you want to come again and again, a place that nurtures moments of stillness. Chanoma Address: 5-12-3 Nishi-Ikebukuro, Toshima, Tokyo Hours: 10:00 am–6:30 pm (last orders at 6:00 pm) Closed: Tuesdays Access: 6 minutes on foot from Kanamechō Station on the Tokyo Metro Yūrakuchō Line; 8 minutes on foot from JR Ikebukuro Station Website: (Originally published in Japanese. Banner photo: The shop as seen from the entrance. © Kawaguchi Yōko.)
Kyodo News
6 hours ago
- Kyodo News
China movie on Japan biological warfare unit to premiere Sept. 18
BEIJING - A Chinese movie on the Imperial Japanese Army's notorious Unit 731 will be screened from Sept. 18, state-run media said Sunday, after its original release date last week passed without explanation. The new screening date falls on the 94th anniversary of the Japanese bombing of a railroad track near Shenyang -- an event that marked the start of the Manchurian Incident, leading to Japan's invasion of northeastern China. The Unit 731 movie, originally scheduled to premiere last Thursday, is one of war-themed works for release this year in China, which commemorates the 80th anniversary of what it calls its victory in the 1937-1945 War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. Millions of people online have expressed their interest in the film about the unit, which according to historians conducted biological and chemical warfare research in China during World War II. Set in China's northeastern region, the movie conveys an anti-war message and reportedly aims to "reveal the crimes" of Unit 731 through a focus on ordinary individuals. The film, which will be shown after the July 25 release of a Chinese movie themed on a massacre in Nanjing committed by Japanese troops in 1937, is feared to fan anti-Japan sentiment in the country. Last Thursday, a Japanese woman was assaulted while walking with her child at a subway station in Suzhou, near Shanghai, sustaining a non-life-threatening injury. Chinese authorities later detained a suspect allegedly involved in the incident but have not provided the details, with Chinese media not reporting on the case. On Sept. 18 last year, a 10-year-old Japanese boy was stabbed on his way to a Japanese school in Shenzhen, southern China. He died from the stab wounds the following day. The Unit 731 film was made with the cooperation of an exhibition hall dedicated to the unit in Harbin in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang as well as local publicity departments of the ruling Communist Party. The unit's research is believed to have included lethal experimentation and testing on humans. Prisoners of war were secretly experimented upon to develop, among other things, plague and cholera-based biological weapons, according to historians. The Japanese government says it has not found any evidence confirming that the unit conducted experiments on human subjects. In 1997, Japan's Supreme Court, in a ruling concerning state screeners' objection to a history textbook's description of the unit's actions in China, said "the view had been established within academic circles to an undeniable extent that Unit 731 had killed many Chinese people through biological experiments."
Yomiuri Shimbun
8 hours ago
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Residents of Akusekijima Island in Southwestern Japan Still Concerned About Earthquakes After Strong Tremors Hit 1 Month Ago
AKUSEKIJIMA ISLAND, Kagoshima — Sunday marked one month since strong earthquakes that reached lower 6 on the Japanese seismic intensity scale hit Akusekijima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, and residents are still concerned that strong tremors may occur again. Several strong earthquakes with epicenters under the sea occurred near the Tokara Islands, which include Akusekijima Island. Akusekijima Island belongs to Toshima Village in the prefecture. Temblors have been occurring less frequently, and residents who evacuated the island have been returning home. However, the area along the island chain has also been rocked by numerous earthquakes in the past, and residents' fears about more quakes have not been eased. According to the Japan Meteorological Agency, earthquakes measuring at least 1 on the Japanese intensity scale — which has a maximum level of 7 — had occurred 2,241 times as of 5 p.m. on Saturday. I departed from Kagoshima Port and traveled on a ship for about 10 hours and 30 minutes and arrived at Akusekijima Island at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday. The slope of a mountain seen from the port had partially collapsed. I did not see any collapsed structures in residential areas, and there were no remarkable traces of the many earthquakes that had occurred. However, Shigehisa Nishi, 58, who runs a minshuku inn where I lodged, and his wife Keiko, 56, said that almost no guests have stayed at the inn and the revenue from their business since July has fallen about 90% from a year ago. Passersby were not seen on the roads in the local community nor were there any tourists. The village government offered economic assistance of ¥50,000 in cash per household for 155 people in a total of 79 households on Akusekijima and Kodakarajima islands. 'Although the cash aid is helpful, I'm anxious because we don't know how long the earthquakes will continue and whether tourists who lodge at our inn will return,' said Keiko. In the wake of the strongest quake which registered a lower 6 that occurred on July 3, a total of 71 residents from Akusekijima and Kodakarajima islands evacuated from the islands. They had stayed in hotels and other places in Kagoshima City and many have returned to the islands by Aug. 2.'The tremors were so violent that I feared electricity poles might fall down,' said Kazunori Arikawa, 73, who runs a minshuku inn, when describing the strongest temblor. He evacuated to Kagoshima City but returned to the island several times to land his fishing boat because a typhoon was predicted to be approaching. A number of earthquakes also hit the area in 2021 and 2023. Therefore, residents must be prepared for an emergency. When I visited a branch office of the village government on Akusekijima Island where a shelter is located, Yuki Matsushita, 36, the chief of the branch office, showed me the emergency supplies. They included canned and packed foods that could last for three days for residents and mats to sleep on. 'Some people become nervous when thinking about the earthquakes,' she said. 'Although the tremors are weak now, there hasn't been a day when zero quakes hit.' She is staying vigilant about more earthquakes occurring. Some people noted problems regarding evacuation to outside of the Akusekijima and Kodakarajima islands, a total of nine households keep 182 cattle. For farmers who cannot leave the islands because they have to take care of livestock, the Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry decided to subsidize half the cost of evacuating animals from the islands and keeping them at evacuation sites. However, as of the end of July, no farmer on the islands had applied for the subsidy. 'If I move my cattle off this island, it will cause them stress, and the burden will be heavy,' said Kazuya Arikawa, 60, who keeps 55 cattle on Akusekijima Island. 'Transporting them is the last option.
