Japan's Parliament voted Friday to enshrine male-only succession for the imperial throne, part of a monarchy that traces its origins back roughly 1,500 years.
Lawmakers did so by revising an Imperial House Law dating back to the 1800s, despite warnings from experts that limiting succession to men in the paternal line will hasten the decline of ******* an's shrinking and aging imperial family, according to the ******* ociated Press.
To address the dwindling number of eligible heirs, the revisions allow distant male relatives to be adopted into the imperial family to father future successors. However, strict rules remain in place limiting the throne to men with royal blood. The changes also allow princesses to retain their royal status after marrying commoners.
The new rules passed by Parliament come as many ******* anese had been calling for Princess Aiko, Emperor Naruhito's 24-year-old daughter, to be allowed to succeed him — now an impossibility.
In Attempt To Connect With Young People, ******* an's Royal Family Debuts On Instagram

Newly released 911 calls capture North Charleston, South Carolina, residents expressing fear as they reported armed teens, gunfire and what one caller described as a "full-out war" before police were ****** aulted during a Fourth of July block party.
Fox News Digital obtained recordings of the calls from Charleston County Dispatch, which reveal multiple residents calling dispatchers shortly before 8:30 p.m. as a city-permitted Fourth of July block party in North Charleston's Chicora-Cherokee neighborhood began spiraling out of control.
Callers reported people openly carrying guns, hearing repeated gunfire and fearing for their safety as officers struggled to disperse hundreds of attendees before multiple officers were ****** aulted, and six people were later charged.
North Charleston Officer Attacked By Crowd In Viral Video After Gunfire Erupts At Block Party
One of the earliest callers warned dispatchers that armed people had gathered near Calvert Street and North Carolina Avenue, telling a 911 operator, "Everybody got guns," before pleading, "We need the police out here bad. They need to come out here."

By Mike Stone, Gram Slattery and Humeyra Pamuk
WASHINGTON/ANKARA, July 8 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump unexpectedly left Turkey on Wednesday aboard an older Air Force One rather than the newly renovated Qatari-donated jet that brought him there, but later boarded the new plane ‌in Britain for the flight to Washington.
The trip to Turkey for the NATO summit, the first international travel for the new plane, took ‌place as hostilities escalated with Iran, a country that borders Turkey.
The unexpected plane switch followed months of scrutiny over the luxury gift intended to serve as a temporary replacement while Boeing struggled to deliver long-delayed next-generation Air Force One planes.
Critics questioned the cost, security and pace of the retrofit.

A pub landlord used his kayak to help save a male swan from a near-fatal injury.
Sussex Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service (SVFRS) said its specialist rescue team was called to the swan, trapped in fishing wire with "a very large lure" between his beak and wing, in Langstone Harbour, Hampshire, on Saturday.
"The swan could have easily lost his life and his family of cygnets and mate lost their family member due to the carelessness of people fishing in the area," SVFRS said.
After a night at a wildlife hospital the swan was "happily released back to his family" on Sunday.
The initial plan was to deploy the SVFRS rowing boat, but it said that would have taken too long to arrive from the rescuers' base in Ford, West Sussex, and the swan "was in trouble and bleeding heavily".

Paramedics conducted CPR on an individual experiencing a "cardiac arrest" at a known address for Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on the day his office disclosed he had been hospitalized, according to police scanner audio obtained by NBC News. Sen. McConnell remains at the hospital, according to a spokesperson. NBC News' Sahil Kapur reports.

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China's newest and most powerful of its three aircraft carriers sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday, the Taiwanese defense ministry said, a day after Taiwan began a five-day military exercise on responding to a Chinese attack.
The Fujian carrier first sailed through the narrow body of water separating China and Taiwan in a trial run last September. It later transited the strait for the first time as a fully commissioned military vessel in December.
China claims the self-governed island as part of its territory and has not ruled out the use of force to bring it under Beijing's control. China regularly sends navy vessels and war planes towards Taiwan in military exercises that have become more frequent in recent years to where they now occur almost daily.
Taiwan on Monday kicked off its own five-day exercise to support its response in case of a possible Chinese military invasion.
The U.S. Navy sends warships through the strait periodically, as do some of its allies, in a warning to Beijing against any attempt to use force to establish its claim to the island.

KANCHANABURI, Thailand (AP) — After decades beneath the surface, a submerged station from World War II's infamous "Death Railway" has resurfaced in Thailand.
Maintenance at Vajiralongkorn Dam drained the hydropower facility's reservoir, revealing Nithe Station for the first time in more than 40 years.
Researchers are racing to survey the site, which was a major depot on the historic 415-kilometer (257-mile) route that connected then Siam and Burma, modern day Thailand and Myanmar.
But it is a race against time, as the completion of the dam's maintenance in August and Southeast Asia's rainy season may soon reflood the area.
During World War II, around 60,000 Allied prisoners of war, as well as hundreds of thousands of Asian laborers, were forced to build the railway by the Empire of ****** an.

TAIPEI, June 9 (Reuters) - Chinese coast guard ships operating around Taiwan in recent days have been "harassing" commercial shipping by asking them information about ‌their point of origin and destination and claiming jurisdiction, Taiwan's coast guard ‌said on Tuesday.
China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, was angered after **** an and the Philippines said last month they would begin formal talks on their maritime boundaries, viewing that as involving waters off Taiwan.
Late on Saturday, Chinese state media reported ships had been sent to carry out a "special maritime traffic law-enforcement operation" in the ‌waters east of Taiwan in ⁠response to the **** anese and Philippine announcement.
In a statement, Taiwan's coast guard said that since Sunday the Chinese ships had broadcast ⁠messages to three passing commercial ships asking for information such as their ports of departure and destination.
Taiwan's own ships broadcast back that these were Taiwanese waters in which China had no jurisdiction and the Chinese vessels should "not harass ships," the coast guard said.