Japan's love-hate relationship with bears

Asia / Pacific

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Cover image: ACCESS ASIA © FRANCE 24

13:07

Issued on: 12/06/2026 - 17:52

13:07 min

From the show

Reading time

1 min

This week, a town north of Tokyo shut down nearly 100 schools following a spate of bear sightings. In another Japanese town last week, a bear attacked four people, opened a water tap and unlatched a window to escape a building it had been trapped in. So are bears becoming a bigger threat? FRANCE 24's Yuka Royer speaks with Kazuhiko Maita from the Institute for Asian Black Bear Research and Preservation, who has survived nine bear attacks himself, about what's behind the recent crisis in Japan.

Emerald Maxwell reports on how authorities caught a large bear this week after days of standoff in the Japanese town of Utsunomiya.

Plus, Charlotte Lam takes a closer look at how Japan 's ageing population and disappearing hunters have led to increasingly frequent bear attacks, and how people in Japan still love the animal despite deadly incidents.

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