News on International Cooperation
This section summarizes news on international cooperation such as international conferences attended by National Diet Library staff, and National Diet Library's international exchange activities.
Please see the Web Archiving Project (WARP) for news before 2023.
News on International Cooperation (2026)
August 10–13, 2026
The World Library and Information Congress 2026—the 90th International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) General Conference—was held in Busan, Korea, on the theme Libraries Powering Transformation. Attending the conference from the NDL was a delegation of 17 employees headed by the Director General Ms. KURATA Keiko, who also attended the annual meeting of the Conference of Directors of National Libraries (CDNL) held on August 11. For more information about the IFLA or CDNL, please see Links (International library organizations related with the National Diet Library).
August 6–9, 2026
The 40th International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) World Congress 2026 was held in Ottawa, Canada. Mr. TOMITA Keiichiro (Director, Children's Services Division, International Library of Children's Literature) attended the conference.
August 3–7, 2026
The International Conference on Dublin Core and Metadata Applications (DCMI 2026) was held in Seoul, Korea. Mr. TAKAHASHI Kosuke (Digital Information Distribution Division, Digital Information Department) attended the conference and made a poster presentation entitled “DC-NDL2026: An Improved Metadata Schema Based on the Dublin Core” (Poster: [PDF: 355KB]).
July 27–31, 2026
The Digital Humanities Conference 2026 was held in Daejeon, Korea, as well as online. Ms. MURATA Yuna (Systems Infrastructure Division, Digital Information Department) attended the conference in person and Ms. AKO Chika (Digital Information Planning Division, Digital Information Department) participated online.
July 8, 2026
The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) General Assembly 2026 was held in The Hague, the Netherlands, as well as online. Mr. MATSUI Satoshi (Senior Secretary, Administrative Department) participated online. For more information about the IFLA, please see Links (International library organizations related with the National Diet Library).
June 17, 2026
The 27th International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) Centre General Assembly was held online. Ms. OKUDA Tomoko (Director, Serials and Non-book Materials Division, Acquisitions and Bibliography Department) participated in the assembly.
June 8, 2026
Sam Helmick, the president of the American Library Association (ALA), visited the NDL.
April 20–23, 2026
The International Internet Preservation Consortium (IIPC) General Assembly and Web Archiving Conference was held in Brussels, Belgium. Mr. SHIMOMURA Shu (Acquisitions Administration and Bibliographic Control Division, Acquisitions and Bibliography Department) and Ms. MATSUNAGA Shinobu (Digital Library Division, Kansai-kan) attended the conference.
April 13–16, 2026
The Bologna Children's Book Fair was held in Bologna, Italy. Mr. FUJITA Sosuke (Resources and Information Division, International Library of Children's Literature) attended the conference.
April 9, 2026
Mr. Hwang Jeong Geun, Librarian of the National Assembly in Republic of Korea, visited the NDL.
April 3, 2026
H.E. Mr. Saeed Albusaidi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth for Culture of the Sultanate of Oman, visited the NDL.
March 11–15, 2026
Meetings of the Association for Asian Studies (AAS), the Council on East Asian Libraries (CEAL) and the North American Coordinating Council on Japanese Library Resources (NCC), etc. were held in Vancouver, Canada. Mr. MATSUZAKI Hiroki (Assistant Director, Service Planning Division, Reader Services and Collections Department) and Mr. MAEDA Hiroshi (Digital Information Distribution Division, Digital Information Department) attended the conferences. Ms. MURAKAMI Kazue (Assistant Director, Acquisitions Administration and Bibliographic Control Division, Acquisitions and Bibliography Department) participated in the pre-conference held online on March 5.
For information on the CEAL and the NCC, see Links (International library organizations related with the National Diet Library).
February 15, 2026
British author Ms. Frances Hardinge was invited to the NDL to give a lecture, "Magpie: Looking for Story Seeds Around Us," at the International Library of Children's Literature (ILCL). The lecture video has been made available on our official YouTube channel.
February 4, 2026
A lecture entitled "Connecting the World with Intelligence and Culture: Initiatives of the National Library of Korea" was held in the Tokyo Main Library of the NDL. Dr. Kim Heesop, Chief Executive of the National Library of Korea (NLK), took the rostrum to present the lecture. Subsequently, Dr. Kim and Ms. KURATA Keiko (Director General of the NDL) had a talk, in which Mr. OBA Toshiyasu, Director General of the Reader Services and Collections Department at the NDL, joined as a facilitator. The program and lecture materials are available on the Events page. For an outline of the lecture, see NDL Newsletter No. 268. The lecture video (Korean audio) has been made available on our official YouTube channel.
February 3, 2026
The NDL invited Prof. Ruth Dassonneville of KU Leuven and held the International Policy Seminar entitled “Recent Political Trends in European Countries.”