LEAFLETTERS BEWARE: The Tokyo High Court on Dec. 9 found three peace activists guilty of trespassing after they handed out antiwar leaflets in a Self-Defense Forces housing complex in 2004, overruling their lower court acquittals.     (Related stories)

FOREIGNER CRACKDOWN: The Justice Ministry announced Dec. 9 that it will tighten standards for granting residence to foreigners of Japanese descent in the wake of the murder of a 7-year-old girl in Hiroshima by a Peruvian man with possible Japanese ancestry.     (Related stories)

SCHOOL MURDER: Yu Hagino, a 23-year-old teacher at a cram school in Kyoto Prefecture, stabbed 12-year-old student Sayano Horimoto to death "in the course of a dispute" on Dec. 11. The girl had previously "poked fun" at her teacher, Hagino told police.     (Related stories)

NOVA PAYOUT: Nova Co. agreed to pay 400,000 yen in an out-of-court settlement to an Australian former employee who sued the language-school chain after his allowance was cut due to his association with a student, it was reported Dec. 11.     (Related stories)

SHARE FIASCO: Japan Securities Clearing Corp. said Dec. 12 that it will force Mizuho Securities Co. to settle its erroneous sell order involving J-Com stock by paying 912,000 yen in cash apiece instead of delivering actual shares. The settlement put the total loss stemming from the shares fiasco to around 40 billion yen.     (Related stories)

BEEF BAN LIFTED: The government on Dec. 12 approved the resumption of U.S. beef imports, lifting a two-year ban in place since the discovery of mad cow disease in what had been one of Japan's biggest sources of low-cost beef.     (Related stories)

DPJ BLOW: The beleaguered Democratic Party of Japan suffered a fresh blow Dec. 12 when veteran party lawmaker Masanori Goto resigned from the Diet after two aides admitted to illegally paying campaign workers in the Sept. 11 general election.     (Related stories)

100 yen LIFE: A drunken 39-year-old Chiba construction worker strangled his 67-year-old father with a necktie after the victim refused to lend him 100 yen for his bus fare, it was reported Dec. 13.     (Related stories)

TEEN DREAMS: Most Japanese teenage girls dream of becoming teachers, housewives or flight attendants, while their Chinese counterparts want to become CEOs, senior managers or work in the media, according to Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living research, reported on on Dec. 13.     (Related stories)

BAFFLING SNUB: Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi criticized China for refusing to participate in a trilateral summit in Malaysia with Japan and South Korea, saying he couldn't understand why the Chinese leader would refuse to meet with him, it was reported Dec. 14.     (Related stories)

UPSWING: Companies became more optimistic in December amid improved exports and domestic consumption levels, showing a continued gradual upswing in the Japanese economy, according to the Bank of Japan's "tankan" quarterly business survey, released Dec. 14.     (Related stories)

MENTAL TEACHERS: A record 3,559 public school teachers took leaves of absence due to mental illness in 2004, according to a government survey released Dec. 14.     (Related stories)

BUILDING SCANDAL: Disgraced architect Hidetsugu Aneha told a Diet Committee that the Tokyo branch manager for Kimura Construction, Akira Shinozuka, told him to reduce the reinforcing steel in building plans produced with falsified quake-resistance data or he would take his business elsewhere, it was reported Dec. 15.     (Related stories)

GROPER HUNT: Police are to use forensic analysis to hunt down gropers on crowded trains by matching tiny fabric fibers from the perpetrator's palm with the victim's clothes, it was reported Dec. 15.     (Related stories)

SEX OFFENDERS MISSING: The whereabouts of nine convicted child-sex offenders who have been released from prison since the National Police Agency started keeping track of them in June is unknown, it was reported Dec. 16.     (Related stories)

Dec. 10 to Dec. 16 WORLD OUTCRY: A barrage of international criticism greeted Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Dec. 9 after he argued the Jewish state should be moved to Europe and questioned whether the Holocaust ever took place.

JET PILE-UP: A jetliner trying to land in heavy snow in Chicago crashed through a boundary fence and slid into a busy street, hitting one vehicle, pinning another beneath it, and killing a child passenger, it was reported Dec. 9.

KYOTO LIVES: A landmark meeting of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change in Montreal agreed Dec. 10 to extend the life of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and launch dialogue between Kyoto members and the United States on long-term action on greenhouse gases.

NUCLEAR HUSH-UP: Britain admitted on Dec. 10 it knew that heavy water -- a key ingredient in producing nuclear weapons -- sold to Norway in the 1950s was in fact bound for Israel.

GREEDY BANDIT: A man who robbed a New Zealand bank was so disappointed with his haul that he phoned the bank several days later and asked them to give him some more money, it was reported Dec. 11. The man was arrested after police traced his second call to the bank.

INFERNO: An raging industrial blaze at a fuel depot just north of London on Dec. 11 sent a huge plume of thick, black smoke over 3,000 meters into the air after a wave of explosions that ripped through the facility ignited 20 fuel storage tanks.

RACE RIOTS: Racial violence erupted in Sydney on Dec. 11 and 12, spreading from beach to suburban areas and leaving 31 people injured. The violence was launched by mobs of youths who attacked people of Middle Eastern appearance on Cronulla Beach in south Sydney.

RIGHTS HOPE: ASEAN, Southeast Asia's regional grouping, agreed Dec. 12 to draft the body's first constitution, a document that could enshrine human rights and democracy in a region that has come under scrutiny for its neglect of both.

PRYOR DIES: Controversial comic Richard Pryor, who helped transform the art with biting commentaries on race and often profane reflections on his own shortcomings, died aged 65 after a long illness, it was reported Dec. 12.

OUTBACK MURDER: Mechanic Bradley John Murdoch is convicted of the murder of British backpacker Peter Falconio on an outback road in 2001 -- one of Australia's most sensational killings in recent years -- and handed a mandatory life sentence.

AGAINST THE ODDS: A 40-year-old woman in Pakistan Kashmir was discovered alive and rescued from under the rubble of her home, more than two months after a massive earthquake hit the area, it was reported Dec. 13. Her neighbors later claimed she had been rescued days after the quake but had chosen to continue living under the rubble.

WTO MEETING: The World Trade Organization began a six-day meeting in Hong Kong on Dec. 13 aimed at laying the groundwork for a global treaty on cutting trade barriers by 2006, but trade ministers say a breakthrough in the thorny issue of agricultural trade is unlikely.

ABDUCTEES: The CIA may have abducted Europeans and illegally transferred them to other countries, a Swiss investigator looking into claims of secret CIA prisons in Europe revealed on Dec. 13.

IRAQ: The United States and Britain are planning a phased withdrawal of their forces from Iraq as soon as a permanent government is installed in Baghdad, it was reported Dec. 13. Troops could begin leaving by as early as next March.

* Iraqis vote -- Iraqis voted Dec. 15 in a landmark election to choose a four-year government that many hope will restore stability and security to the war-ravaged country.

* Bush admission -- U.S. President George W. Bush admitted to "tactical mistakes" but defended his decision to invade the country and reserved the right to pre-emptive action in the future, it was reported Dec. 16.

DEATH ROW DEBATE: Convicted killer Stanley "Tookie" Williams, the Crips gang cofounder whose case stirred a national debate in the U.S. about capital punishment versus the possibility of redemption, was executed by lethal injection on Dec. 13, despite last-minute hopes of a grant of clemency by Calif. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

STEM CELL DOUBTS: A U.S. stem cell expert who lent his name and credibility to cloning pioneer Hwang Woo Suk asked that his name be removed from their landmark paper and questioned whether the work had been falsified, it was reported Dec. 15, raising doubts over the validity of the South Korean scientist's work.

GAY COWBOYS: The cowboys-in-love drama "Brokeback Mountain" received a leading seven Golden Globe nominations, it was reported Dec. 15, but still faces an uphill battle ahead of the Oscars, where a gay-themed film has never won the Best Picture prize.