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‘Catnomics’: how Japan’s feline fixation has become an industry worth billions

Feline features stare out from the covers of umpteen novels, they have an officially designated day devoted to their mystique and popularity, and have outnumbered dogs as pets for a decade. The influence of cats is evident across every corner of Japanese society, with a recent report crediting them with generating an expected ¥3tn ($18.8bn) in value to the Japanese economy this year – a phenomenon dubbed “catnomics”. The power of the paw is especially evident in one retro neighbourhood of Tokyo, where on a recent afternoon North American, Australian and European visitors milled around the capital’s self-proclaimed “cat town”. They had been drawn to Yanaka Ginza, in the city’s north-east, by its historical association with cats, whose image adorns shopfronts and street signs, and where visitors can eat cat-shaped sweets and design personalised hanko seals on a similar theme. The crowds and the warm weather appeared to have kept Yanaka Ginza’s furry residents out of sight. Instead, visitors paused at souvenir shops to buy “lucky” black cat fridge magnets, postcards, chopsticks and crockery. “There have always been cats in Yanaka because there are lots of Buddhist temples here,” says Yumiko Yamashita, owner of several cats and of the Neco Action store. “In the old days they roamed around and even went into different houses, but they’re less visible these days. They prefer to stay indoors on a hot day like this.” The global boom in Japanese literature has turned the cat into a marketing juggernaut, more than a century after Natsume Sōseki wrote one of the country’s best-known novels, I Am a Cat, told from the point of view of a household cat. Cats figure prominently in the surrealist novels of Haruki Murakami, and in dozens of other works, notably Hiro Arikawa’s The Travelling Cat Chronicles and Takashi Hiraide’s The Guest Cat. Publishers have even exploited feline marketing power to create covers for books that have little or no connection to the animal. Clawing in the money In a nation of pet lovers – where domesticated dogs and cats outnumber children aged under 15, Japanese households kept 8.8 million cats in 2025, compared with 6.8 million dogs, according to a survey by the Japan Pet Food Association. The average cat-owning household, the survey said, spends almost ¥1.8m ($11,300) over the course of their moggy’s life. It is that level of devotion that makes cats big business. In his most recent report on “catnomics”, Katsuhiro Miyamoto, professor emeritus at Kansai University, estimates that animals will add just under ¥3tn ($18.8bn) in value to the Japanese economy in 2026. Combining estimates of consumer spending at cat cafes and on items such as photo books with sales and salaries among cat food manufacturers and related companies, Miyamoto noted that the estimate fell just short of beating the economic impact of the 2025 World Exposition in Osaka. He added, though, that cats were still generating “a comparable economic effect, demonstrating the significant contribution cats are making to the Japanese economy”. High-profile cat owners in Japan include the emperor and empress, and the prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, has expressed a preference for cats over dogs. Nature’s most Zen-like creatures Cats are believed to have been introduced into Japan during the Nara period (710-794) via Japanese envoys returning from Tang Dynasty China. Many were taken in by temples, where they protected religious scriptures from hungry rodents – a role that imbued them with a special, even mystic, status among their human counterparts. Cats are nature’s most Zen-like creatures, effortlessly achieving an aura of calm and detachment that mere mortals spend an entire lifetime trying, and failing, to attain. “Cats don’t live for the moment; they live in the moment,” the Japan-based author Stephen Mansfield said. “Dwelling neither in the past or future, their minds are likely a lot less cluttered than ours.” Dog lovers will disagree, but Japanese folklore casts cats as wholly benign beings, whose natural compassion can be a harbinger of good fortune – qualities encapsulated in the maneki neko – a statue of a cat, its paw raised in the expectation of “catching” any luck passing its way. The porcelain statues are thought to have been inspired by Gōtokuji temple in Kyoto where, as legend has it, a wealthy feudal lord was out hunting when he was caught in a fierce storm. After sheltering beneath a tree, he spotted a cat beckoning him from the steps of the dilapidated temple. As he approached the animal, a bolt of lightning struck the spot where he had been sheltering only seconds earlier. In a show of gratitude, the lord bought the temple and restored it to its former glory. These days the maneki neko are a common sight in shops and restaurants whose owners hoping for their Gōtokuji moment. Like their cousins on depopulated Aoshima, Japan’s cats can only thrive as long as there are enough humans to sustain them. With long-term population decline now a near inevitability, the country’s ageing demographics could soon see significantly fewer cats being kept as pets. But for the time being, Japan’s felines have every reason to feel like the cats that got the cream.

‘Makes no sense’: experts doubt pause in US arms sale to Taiwan is due to Iran war

The Trump administration’s war against Iran should have no impact on arms sales to Taiwan, experts have said, after a US official suggested a pause in the delivery of a key weapons package was due to the Gulf conflict. Analysts told the Guardian that a $14bn arms package left in limbo after Donald Trump’s meeting with Xi Jinping could take up to six years to process, and there was a “low likelihood” of any true connection between events in Iran and weapons delivery to Taiwan. Uncertainty over Washington’s support for the island democracy re-emerged after Trump suggested he could use arms sales to Taiwan as a “negotiating chip” in future talks with Beijing. Comments by Washington’s acting navy secretary, Hung Cao, at a congressional hearing on Thursday provoked further alarm in Taipei after he suggested that the weapons package awaiting Trump’s sign off for months had been paused. “Right now we’re doing a pause in order to make sure we have the munitions we need for Epic Fury [the Iran war],” he said. “We’re just making sure we have everything, then the foreign military sales will continue when the administration deems necessary.” The US has reportedly drained its missile stockpiles since launching its increasingly intractable war against Iran on 28 February. Cao’s justification for the pause “makes no sense”, according to Rupert Hammond-Chambers, president of the US-Taiwan Business Council and a senior adviser at strategic consultancy group Bower Group Asia. There is a “very very low likelihood” that there is any true connection between events in Iran and weapons delivery to Taiwan, Hammond-Chambers said, adding that the weapons deals that Trump is considering at the moment “don’t get delivered for anywhere from three to six years”. “If he sends those congressional notifications by the end of June, you’re talking about another six to 12 months before the contract is signed, and then the clock starts on delivery. So we’re really into the 2030s [by the time Taiwan’s weapons are delivered],” he said. Over the weekend, Reuters reported comments from an unnamed US official that the military had “more than enough munitions, ammo, and stockpiles to serve all of President Trump’s strategic goals and beyond”, and that the pause in sales to Taiwan was “unrelated to the war with Iran”. China claims Taiwan as a breakaway province, despite never having ruled it, and strongly opposes Washington’s arms sales to the island democracy. US law dictates that Washington should supply Taiwan with defensive materials in order for the island to maintain a “sufficient self-defense capability”. Xi told Trump in Beijing this month that the Taiwan issue was “the most important issue in China-US relations,” according to a Chinese foreign ministry statement. Trump has said he made no commitments about Taiwan during the meeting with Xi, but his statements since have cast doubt over Washington’s support. Trump’s suggestion he could use Taiwan arms sales as a bargaining chip would violate Washington’s longstanding policy that it does not discuss the issue with Beijing. The US president’s comment last week that he may speak directly with Taiwan’s president, Lai Ching-te, was another break from decades of diplomatic protocol. No sitting US president has spoken to a Taiwanese president since 1979, when Washington shifted diplomatic recognition to Beijing, and it would enrage China if the call were to take place. On Monday, five lawmakers from Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive party, joined by Peter Mattis, president of the Jamestown Foundation, a thinktank, held a press conference addressing Taiwan-US relations in the wake of the Xi-Trump summit. There, DPP legislator Ngalim Tiunn reiterated that “Taiwan’s communication channels with the US remain open and smooth”. Mattis said he also thought Cao’s comments were not accurate, saying there was “no way” in which arms packages to Taiwan that had already been decided and notified to the US Congress could be affected by the Iran conflict. “Whatever has been said is somebody misspeaking and not necessarily understanding the technical details of how US arms sales work,” he said. “I think these are separate issues and should be treated differently.” Hammond-Chambers said that if Trump approved the sales “in the next four to six weeks” then uncertainty about US support for Taipei “mostly goes away”. But if delays were to drag on into the autumn – when Trump is set to host Xi in Washington, before another two potential meetings at the Apec summit in China in November and the G20 summit in Miami in December – then it “puts Taiwan in a terrible position”. The White House and China’s Taiwan Affairs Office were approached for comment.

Seven heat-related deaths in France as May records set in several countries

Seven people have died in France in an extreme early summer heat event affecting a swathe of western Europe, with record high temperatures for May recorded for a second day in several countries. In France, which logged its hottest ever May day on Monday and again on Tuesday, the weather agency Météo France said the heatwave could last through the week and predicted temperatures could reach 39C in some areas. “What I can say today is that there have been seven deaths linked directly or indirectly to the heat,” the French government spokesperson Maud Bregeon told TF1 television, adding that five of the deaths had been by drowning. The UK also reported its hottest ever day for May, at 35C near London, breaking a record of 33.5C set on Monday, as a high-pressure system trapped warm air over western Europe. Models have already estimated that with the effects of climate breakdown, June heatwaves are now about 10 times more likely in Europe than they were in the preindustrial era, and the same trajectory is becoming evident for May. “This extension of the heatwave season is entirely characteristic of the effects of climate change,” Robert Vautard, a climate researcher, told Agence France-Presse. “Eventually, we will be seeing similar heat events in April and October.” In Spain, widespread highs of 36-38C in the Guadiana, Guadalquivir and Ebro valleys were expected to continue possibly until Friday, the state weather service Aemet said, adding that temperatures could reach 40C in some areas. In Italy’s Lazio region, which includes Rome, authorities have imposed restrictions on work in conditions “with prolonged exposure in the sun”, for example on farms, construction sites and in the delivery sector, between 12.30pm and 4pm. In France, the national heat index, which measures the average temperature across the country, reached 24.8C, according to provisional readings from Météo France, surpassing Monday’s 24.6C, which was also a record. Thirteen of France’s 96 administrative departments have been placed on an orange high temperature alert, the second highest level, requiring the population to “be vigilant and take precautions”. Another 29 were on a more moderate yellow warning. It was the first time the national heat warning system had been activated in May since it was introduced in 2004. “This is an unprecedented event with a one in 1,000 chance of happening at this time of year in the climate of 1979 to 2025,” Christophe Cassou, a climate scientist, told Le Monde. “It would have been virtually impossible in the preindustrial era.” The prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, called a meeting of key ministers on Thursday to assess government preparations for heatwaves after more than 350 weather stations across France recorded new monthly highs on Monday. In Ireland, a record May temperature of 28.8C was recorded at two weather stations, Met Éireann data showed. More heat records could be broken this week, forecasters said, with temperatures exceeding norms by 12C or 13C, in what Météo France described as a “premature, remarkable and long” heat episode. The agency said the episode was caused by a heat dome, with hot air from Morocco trapped under an area of high pressure, and that Europe could expect such events to “occur more and more often, earlier and earlier, and to be more and more intense”. Two deaths in France on Sunday have been directly attributed to the heat: a woman competing in a Hyrox fitness competition in Lyon died of hyperthermia, and a 53-year-old man had a heart attack during a 10km running race in Paris. Sixteen people were hospitalised, including 10 in a critical condition, during another road race in the Paris suburb of Maisons-Alfort. Three teenagers were among those who drowned in swimming accidents over the weekend. High temperatures drove many people to the country’s beaches and rivers to cool off in the water, even though lifeguard supervision is not due to start in most areas until July. While parts of the UK are entering a heatwave – with temperatures exceeding 26C to 28C, depending on the location, for three consecutive days – in France, night-time temperatures must also stay above a certain level for a heatwave to be declared.

Middle East crisis: Iran’s foreign ministry says US broke ceasefire with overnight strikes – as it happened

Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel is “intensifying” its military operations in Lebanon, with the IDF operating with “large forces on the ‌ground” in order to take control of “strategic areas”.Earlier, a military official confirmed to AFP that Israeli forces had begun operating beyond its so-called “yellow line”, which marks the 10km (six miles) area deep inside southern Lebanon which Israel is already occupying. A reminder that these expanded ground operations are all despite a ceasefire that has been in place since 17 April. Israel has continued to intensify its strikes on Lebanon, killing thousands of people while claiming it is acting to remove threats from Hezbollah. Meanwhile, the proposed peace agreement between Iran and the US seemed to remain on the table on Tuesday despite US bombings of Iranian targets – the first military action by Washington since the 8 April ceasefire. The Iranian foreign ministry denounced the US attack – aimed at missile launchers and efforts to lay fresh mines in the strait of Hormuz – as “an act of bad faith” and “a definitive violation of the ceasefire” and said it would not leave aggression unanswered. But it did not pull out of the talks that were continuing under the joint mediation of Pakistan and Qatar. Here’s our report. US Central Command denied reports that that US navy has “quietly” resumed so-called ‘Project Freedom’ in the strait of Hormuz. “US forces are not currently escorting commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz,” Centcom said in a statement shared on X.It comes after The Wall Street Journal (paywall) reported, citing US military officials, that the US navy “had quietly guided a Greek supertanker laden with two million barrels of crude oil as it crossed the waterway off the Omani coast”. Oil rose back above $100 a barrel on Tuesday, after the fresh US strikes on Iran dashed hopes of a breakthrough, with experts saying that whatever the outcome of peace talks, the global energy market may now be past the “point of no return”. Here’s our story.

Iran remains in peace talks despite ‘bad faith’ US bombings of Iranian targets

A proposed peace agreement between Iran and the US seemed to remain on the table on Tuesday despite US bombings of Iranian targets. The Iranian foreign ministry denounced the US attack – aimed at missile launchers and efforts to lay fresh mines in the strait of Hormuz – as “an act of bad faith” and “a definitive violation of the ceasefire” and said it would not leave aggression unanswered. But it did not pull out of the talks that were continuing under the joint mediation of Pakistan and Qatar. The Iranian military announced no specific reprisals, suggesting it did not want the attack – which killed four Iranian soldiers – to disrupt the delicate last steps towards an agreement that it intends to hail as one of the great milestones in Iran’s history of resistance. Brent oil futures climbed 4% after news of the renewed fighting. In a sign that Donald Trump recognises the conflict has reached a decisive point, he had been due to convene a rare cabinet meeting at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, but on Tuesday he said on Truth Social that this had been postponed due to bad weather. As Trump continued to face questions about how a planned peace deal would achieve the objectives he set out at the start of the war, he appeared to copy and paste a rambling social media post from last week that claimed Democrats and the media would proclaim an Iranian victory even if Tehran “surrenders, admits their Navy is gone and resting at the bottom of the sea, and their Air Force is no longer with us, and if their entire Military walks out of Tehran, weapons dropped and hands held high, each shouting ‘I surrender, I surrender’ while wildly waving the representative White Flag”. Iran’s parliamentary speaker and chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, remained in Doha for a second day on Tuesday trying to agree the means by which more than $12bn (£9bn) in frozen Iranian assets could be unlocked and sent to an Iranian account. He is also seeking sanctions relief for Iran’s oil and petrochemical exports for the 60-day period set aside to negotiate fresh constraints on Iran’s nuclear programme. A separate 30-day timeframe has been allocated in the agreement for the US to lift the blockade of Iranian oil ports and for Iran to allow commercial shipping through the strait of Hormuz, restoring maritime traffic to levels from before Israel and the US started the war on 28 February. The brief agreement, which would end the war but not delineate the peace, is fraught with political sensitivity as all sides know they must try to emerge with one they can exhibit to their respective constituencies as proof that the sacrifice was worthwhile. Hardliners in Washington, Tehran and Jerusalem are all putting pressure on their negotiators not to make more concessions. Mahmoud Nabavian, a member of Iran’s parliamentary national security and foreign policy commission, insisted no agreement should relinquish Iranian control of the strait. But Ghalibaf, overwhelmingly re-elected as speaker this week, can for the moment marginalise this opposition. Reports said he was focused on the method of accessing frozen Iranian assets, described as the last serious dispute between Tehran and Washington. Owing to the accumulated lack of trust, no further negotiations over the future of the strait or the nuclear programme can take place without the prior transfer of frozen Iranian funds, his allies said. The consultations in Qatar have resulted in progress towards resolving the issue of frozen Iranian assets, but one Iranian MP, Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani, claimed a plan for $12bn to be transferred from Qatar to a Russian account before being sent to Iran had been thwarted by the US at the last minute. He warned that if the war restarted, Iran knew the whereabouts of the hotels in Doha and Dubai used by Trump’s lead negotiators, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, and “next time they would be hit”. Apart from the issue of Iran’s frozen assets, Tehran is trying to strengthen the section committing Israel to a ceasefire in Lebanon. With Israel admitting it was launching operations north of the yellow line to hit Hezbollah’s missiles, the war appeared to be escalating, not winding down. On Tuesday evening the Israeli military issued two new evacuation warnings for residents of 19 villages across southern Lebanon, as it expanded its ground operations deeper inside Lebanese territory. A few hours later, the Lebanese health ministry said Israeli strikes in recent hours had killed 31 people and wounded 40. Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who succeeded his father after he was killed by US-Israeli strikes on the opening day of the war, claimed the tide of history was moving in Iran’s favour and called for unity among Muslim countries, in a statement that marked the start of the hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. Khamenei, who has not been seen in public or issued any recorded audio since his elevation in March, projected confidence as he predicted the elimination of Israel by 2040. He said: “What is certain is that the hands of time will not turn backwards and the nations and lands of the region will no longer serve as shields for American bases. The United States not only will no longer have a safe haven for its mischief and for establishing military bases in the region but, day by day, it is growing more distant from its former status.” He added: “The shaken Zionist regime and the cancerous tumour of Israel are approaching the final stages of their wretched existence.” His remarks put into perspective Trump’s much-derided claim that Arab states, as well as Turkey and Iran, should normalise relations with Israel.

Why give a tax break for HGVs that wreck our roads? | Brief letters

Why is the government giving heavy goods vehicles a free ride for a year, with its “12-month vehicle tax holiday” (Report 20 May), when they cause such huge road damage to our crumbling road system (The pothole puzzle: the bumpy ride to fixing Britain’s broken roads, 23 May)? A 44-tonne HGV, the industry standard, is 100,000 times more damaging to road surfaces than a Ford Focus. Philippa Edmunds East Twickenham, London • Within five years, Sunderland have moved from League One to seventh place in the Premier League with a place in Europe; they got two columns in Monday’s paper. West Ham got three pages, Manchester City two, and Liverpool and Arsenal one each. Manchester United got three columns, and Tottenham got eight. Speaking as a Wearsider, this looks like a bit of big-boy bias. Bob Powley Leeds • Before everyone rushes to buy tomato timers to help them with their work, as advocated by Zahra Onsori (The one change that worked, 25 May), could I suggest an alternative? I have long had a clockwork orange timer which simultaneously manages to be both menacing and fun. Margaret Squires St Andrews, Fife • With all the negative stuff coming out of the US, how heartwarming it was to read your Experience column (We found a baby on the subway – now he’s our 26-year-old son, 22 May). It brought tears to my eyes, thinking that there is good in the world, despite everything. Barbara Thompson Sheffield • So, Rachel Reeves is urging ministers to buy British when procuring steel, energy and AI, among other things (Report, 25 May). Could she start by telling Palantir to get lost? Steve Boulding Stanwardine, Shropshire • Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.

Moscow wants to ‘destabilise’ Europe, EU chief warns, as countries summon Russian ambassadors over Kyiv threats – as it happened

… and on that note, it’s a wrap for today! Several European countries, including Germany (14:50), the Netherlands (15:22) and Norway (14:02), and the European Union (13:19) have summoned the heads of the Russian diplomatic missions to protest over Moscow’s warning suggesting further strikes on Kyiv. Mocking the EU’s response insisting that its diplomats would remain in Kyiv, the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said “they have got diplomats to spare” (17:59). Separately, the European Commission’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, warned that Moscow was seeking to “destabilise” Europe, as she appeared alongside the three Baltic presidents in a show of solidarity with the region amid Russian threats (14:56, 15:00, 15:20). Separately, An investigation is under way after four people, including two children, were killed when a school minibus collided with a train in northern Belgium (11:28, 11:41, 11:46, 12:31, 12:49). Seven people have died in France in an extreme early-summer heat event that is affecting a swathe of western Europe, as France and the UK set record highs for May and temperatures were forecast to rise further on Tuesday. If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at jakub.krupa@theguardian.com. I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.

Italy’s top court rules against tourist refused tap water in Dolomites hotel

A tourist’s simple request for a glass of tap water at a hotel restaurant in the Italian Dolomites has culminated in Italy’s top court ruling that being served water from the tap is not a consumer right, after a lengthy and costly legal saga. The case dates back to 2019 when the woman spent a week at the five-star hotel in the ski resort of Corvara, in Badia, over Christmas and new year. She was on a half-board deal with the evening meal included, except for drinks. According to Italian press reports, the woman repeatedly asked for tap water with her meal, even offering to pay for it. This was refused and instead she arrived at dinner each night to find a 0.75-litre bottle of mineral water, costing €7, on the table. During her stay, the tourist complained about “constantly being denied the opportunity to consume tap water, and instead being forced to purchase bottled water”, Corriere Alto Adige reported, citing court papers. The woman then pursued legal action, arguing water was “a natural resource and a universal human right” and that “the free provision of a minimum vital quantity is necessary to meet essential needs and must be guaranteed”, Corriere wrote. The woman considered tap water to be an integral part of the service at a restaurant or hotel, “much like finding a bed with sheets, a warm room and soap in the bathroom”. She sought €2,700 in compensation for the “economic damage and emotional distress” suffered. The first and second-instance courts dismissed her case and the woman then appealed to the supreme court of cassation. That court confirmed there was no law in Italy obliging restaurant managers or hoteliers to serve customers tap water, and dismissed the case too. Asking for free tap water at a restaurant in Italy is generally considered a breach of etiquette, especially if the server has already offered the choice of a bottle of natural or sparkling water. But customers are becoming bolder, with many seeking to avoid using plastic, and more restaurants now offer filtered water.