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Japan has hanged three death-row inmates, the first executions under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
The three were put to death in the early hours of Thursday, the Justice Ministry has confirmed. One of them was convicted of killing a young girl.
Japan traditionally executes several prisoners at a time. These are the first executions since September 2012.
Japan is one of the few industrialized nations to retain the death penalty, usually reserved for multiple murders.
“I ordered the executions after giving careful consideration to the matter,” Justice Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said in a press briefing.
“These were extremely cruel cases in which victims were deprived of their precious lives for very selfish reasons.”
The three men hanged were indentified as Kaoru Kobayashi, 44, who killed a 7-year-old girl, Masahiro Kanagawa, 29, who killed one man and injured seven others outside a Tokyo shopping mall in 2008, and Keiki Muto, 62, who killed a bar owner for money in 2002.
Japan has hanged three death-row inmates, the first executions under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe
Rights group Amnesty International’s branch in Japan has said that it “strongly condemns” Thursday’s executions.
Though the majority support the death penalty, rights groups say Japan’s death row is particularly harsh, with the condemned allowed few visits and little exercise.
Sometimes held for decades, they are not warned in advance of when they will be put to death.
Rights groups also highlight Japan’s 99% conviction rate, with most convictions based on confessions, as worrying, correspondents say.
There are currently more than 130 people on death row, including Shoko Asahara, the mastermind behind the 1995 sarin gas attacks on the Tokyo subway.
No executions were carried out in 2011, but they were restarted in March 2012 under the previous Democratic Party government. Shinzo Abe came to power in a landslide election win in December 2012.
Official figures in Japan as of 2011 put support for capital punishment at over 80%.
Japan’s monthly trade deficit hit a record in January after its recent aggressive monetary policy stance weakened the yen sharply.
Exports rose in January, the first jump in eight months, as its goods became more affordable to foreign buyers.
However, a weak currency also pushed up its import bill resulting in a monthly trade deficit of 1.6 trillion yen ($17.1 billion), a 10% jump from a year ago.
Japan’s deficit has also been impacted by an increase in fuel imports.
The world’s third-largest economy has seen a rise in fuel imports, as most of Japan’s nuclear reactors continue to remain closed.
Japan’s imports rose 7.3% in January, from a year earlier. One of the biggest jumps was in the import of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), which surged more than 28%.
Meanwhile, exports rose 6.4%, driven up mainly by shipments of manufactured goods, the customs and tariff bureau said.
Japan’s exports, one of the key drivers of its economic growth, have been hurt by a variety of factors.
Demand from the eurozone, of Japan’s biggest markets, has been hurt by the region’s ongoing debt crisis.
Japan’s monthly trade deficit hit a record in January after its recent aggressive monetary policy stance weakened the yen sharply
A territorial dispute with China has hit sales of Japanese goods to the country, Japan’s biggest trading partner, over the past few months.
However, the latest data indicated that things may be starting to change.
Japan’s shipments to China raised by 3% in January from a year earlier, the first rise since May.
At the same time, exports to the US, the world’s biggest economy, also jumped 10.9%, further adding to hopes of a recovery in the sector.
Meanwhile, the pace of decline in exports to the European Union also slowed during the month.
There are hopes that as shipments to key markets recover and the yen continues to remain weak, Japan’s export sector may see a sustained recovery.
The yen has dipped nearly 15% against the US dollar since November.
A weak currency helps boost profits of exporters when they repatriate their foreign earnings back home, giving them a much bigger pile of cash to invest at the end of the financial year.
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Sasago, a major road tunnel, has collapsed in Japan, trapping a number of vehicles and leaving seven people missing, local media reports say.
Survivors described how large sections of concrete fell on top of cars in the Sasago tunnel.
Rescuers managed to reach the scene, but were unsure how many cars were buried there.
The incident happened at about 08:00 local time, about 80 km (50 miles) west of Tokyo.
Sasago tunnel – one of Japan’s longest – links the capital to the city of Nagoya.
Public broadcaster NHK quoted its reporter as saying that black smoke was coming out of the tunnel and there appeared to be a fire inside.
Pictures from closed circuit TV cameras inside the tunnel showed a section of the tunnel of up to 100 m (328 ft) that had caved in on the Tokyo-bound lanes on the Chuo Expressway in Yamanashi prefecture.
Sasago tunnel has collapsed in Japan, trapping a number of vehicles and leaving seven people missing
“We don’t know exactly how many vehicles are on fire,” a traffic police official told the AFP news agency.
The official added that a woman was taken to hospital after she had made her way out of the tunnel.
The woman said she was with five other people in a van, but added: “I have no idea about what happened to the five others. I don’t know how many vehicles were ahead and behind ours.”
A reporter for NHK described driving through the tunnel as it began to collapse, seeing other cars trapped and on fire. His car was badly damaged, he said.
Another survivor told the broadcaster that he saw “a concrete part of the ceiling fall off all of a sudden when I was driving inside. I saw a fire coming from a crushed car”.
He added that he was “frightened” and walked for an hour to get out of the tunnel.
The Sasago tunnel is an estimated 4.3 km-long (2.7 miles). The twin-bore tunnel is on one of the major highways out of Tokyo.
The road has had to be closed because of the seriousness of the accident.
Firefighters are still trying to extinguish the blaze.
It is not clear what may have caused the roof to collapse.
Japan is prone to large earthquakes, but none were reported in the area this morning.
The tunnel’s closure is expected to bring traffic chaos as thousands of weekend travelers head back to Tokyo on Sunday afternoon.
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Japanese politicians have set sail for a group of disputed islands, in the teeth of protests by China which claims them for its own.
A flotilla of some 20 Japanese boats set out for the Senkaku (Chinese: Diaoyu) islands and is expected to anchor off them early on Sunday.
The politicians plan to commemorate Japanese dead in World War II, when Japan occupied eastern China.
But Japan’s government has denied them permission to land on the islands.
China says the event will undermine its “territorial sovereignty” and this is the latest move in an escalating dispute over the islands.
On Friday, Japan deported several Chinese activists who had landed there this week.
Japanese politicians have set sail for a group of disputed islands, in the teeth of protests by China which claims them for its own
The islands, also claimed by Taiwan, are close to strategically important shipping lanes, offer rich fishing grounds and are thought to contain oil deposits.
Emotions have been running high since the commemoration on Wednesday of Japan’s surrender in World War II, when China and South Korea both protested against a visit to a Tokyo war shrine by two Japanese cabinet members.
Just before 21:00, the 150-strong party sailed out of the Japanese port of Ishigaki.
They are expected to arrive off the disputed islands in the East China Sea at dawn on Sunday.
“I want to show the international community that these islands are ours,” Kenichi Kojima, a local politician from Kanagawa, near Tokyo, told AFP news agency before he boarded.
“It is Japan’s future at stake.”
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gan said: “Any unilateral action taken by Japan on the Diaoyu Islands is illegal and invalid.”
Earlier this week, activists sailed to the disputed island chain from Hong Kong in a protest aimed at promoting Chinese sovereignty.
China had praised Japan’s “wise” decision to free them, saying in an article on Xinhua news agency’s website that the speedy action had averted a deterioration in relations.
Rows over the disputed islands have caused Sino-Japanese ties to freeze in the past.
China claims the largely uninhabited islands has been a part of its territory since ancient times but Japan says it took control of the archipelago in the late 1890s after making sure they were uninhabited.
In September 2010, relations plummeted after the arrest of a Chinese trawler captain near the islands.
The captain was accused of ramming two Japanese patrol vessels in the area, but Japan eventually dropped the charges against him.
Japan announces that will shoot down a North Korean rocket if necessary, as new satellite images appeared to show preparations for the April launch.
Japanese Defense Minister Naoki Tanaka issued the order to intercept the rocket if it threatened Japan’s territory.
Pyongyang says it will launch a satellite on a rocket between 12 and 16 April.
Satellite images taken on Wednesday indicate that work at the launch site is under way, says a US university.
Naoki Tanaka had issued an earlier order on Tuesday to the country’s defense forces to prepare ”destruction measures against ballistic missiles”.
On Friday, he told reporters in Tokyo that he had received cabinet approval to shoot down the rocket if necessary.
Japan began preparing missile defense systems last week.
Pyongyang said it plans to fire a rocket to put a satellite into orbit next month to mark the centennial of the birth of founding leader Kim Il-Sung.
The move has sparked international criticism. North Korea claims the launch is for scientific research and ”peaceful purposes”.
But the United States and North Korea’s neighbors insist it will be a disguised long-range missile test, contravening UN resolutions.
The resolutions were imposed after a similar launch in April 2009. Japan is particularly concerned as the last North Korean rocket was launched over the north of the country.
Japan announces that will shoot down a North Korean rocket if necessary, as new satellite images appeared to show preparations for the April launch
It is thought that the North Korean rocket will follow a new southern trajectory instead of a route to the east over Japan. It will now pass close to south-western Japan instead.
South Korea also warned earlier this week that it might shoot down any North Korean rocket that strayed into its territory.
US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell over the weekend said that the rocket may affect an area between Australia, Indonesia and the Philippines.
President Benigno Aquino III has expressed concern that rocket debris may fall on Philippine territory, and called on Pyongyang to abandon the launch.
US media reports say that the US is sending its sea-based X-band radar – a radar system that sits atop a floating platform – out into the Pacific to monitor the launch. Officials have confirmed the craft left Hawaii on 23 March.
The controversial launch also comes only weeks after North Korea agreed to return to talks on its nuclear programme in return for food aid from the US – a deal which is now on hold.
At the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul earlier this week, President Barack Obama warned Pyongyang that its planned launch would only increase its isolation and lead to further sanctions.
The new satellite images, taken by a private US firm, DigitalGlobe, show that preparations are proceeding at the Tongchang-dong launch site in North Korea.
An analysis published on the 38 North website by the US-Korea Institute at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) said that ”activity has been ongoing” at the site since last week.
”Unless some major setback occurs, the North Koreans will be able to launch during the declared launch window starting 12 April 2012,” said the article by the institute at the Johns Hopkins University.
Meanwhile, South Korean media is reporting that the North fired two short-range missiles, believed to be surface-to-ship missiles, on Thursday.
The test firing of the KN-01 missiles took place off the west coast in North Pyongan Province, the newspapers reported on Friday, citing military sources in South Korea.
The incident did not appear to be related to the upcoming rocket launch, the sources said.
Military officers believed that the move was a warning by Pyongyang to South Korean and US military, the Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported.
A Japanese fishing vessel swept away by the March 2011 tsunami has been spotted bobbing in the seas near British Columbia in western Canada.
The trawler is part of the 5 million tons of debris that were swept into the ocean by the devastating tsunami when a magnitude-9.0 earthquake struck Japan.
The 23ft wall of water struck the east coast of the island nation following a 9.0 earthquake, sweeping everything from cars to houses into the ocean leaving a wake of devastation.
A Canadian military air patrol spotted the vessel – 4,703 miles away from where it was originally moored – floating towards the shore.
It has been determined that the boat has been adrift without anybody at the helm since March 11 last year.
The 50-foot-long (15-meter-long) vessel was recently about 160 miles (260 kilometers) west of Haida Gwaii, islands off the north-coast of British Columbia, slowly drifting toward shore.
The Japanese trawler is part of the 5 million tons of debris that were swept into the ocean by the last year tsunami
A maritime warning has been issued because the vessel could pose a navigational hazard.
The Japan Coast Guard identified the owner of the fishing trawler after being contacted by Canadian officials, who were able to provide the identification number on the hull of the ship.
The vessel, which was used for squid fishing, was moored at Hachinohe in the Aomori prefecture when the tsunami hit, said Toshiro Yoshinaga, a Coast Guard official.
Canada’s transport ministry is monitoring the vessel for marine pollution and to see if it becomes an obstruction though there are no reports of leaks from the vessel.
The tsunami last March generated more than 25 million tons of debris, say researchers at the University of Hawaii. Between four and eight million tons were washed into the ocean, with one to two million tons still floating on the surface.
The main mass of the debris is not expected to make landfall in North America until March 2014.
Maria Cantwell, US senator for Washington state, said the boat was expected to drift slowly south.
“On its current trajectory and speed, the vessel wouldn’t make landfall for approximately 50 days,” Senator Maria Cantwell said in a statement.
The earthquake, which struck about 230 miles northeast of Tokyo, was the largest in the country’s history.
Thousands of people were killed when the earthquake triggered the tsunami and other giant waves that devastated cities and rural areas.
According to the official toll, the disasters left 15,839 dead, 5,950 injured, and 3,642 missing.
Japan prepares its anti-missile defense systems in response to the planned launch of a North Korean long-range rocket next month, Defense Minister Naoki Tanaka has said.
Reports said the defense systems would be deployed near the island of Okinawa to shoot down the rocket should it threaten Japanese territory.
North Korea says the rocket will put a satellite into orbit.
But the US and its allies believe the launch is a pretext for a missile test.
Pyongyang said last week it was to mark the 100th birthday of its late Great Leader Kim Il-sung with the launch.
The announcement drew widespread criticism that the launch would violate UN Security Council resolutions.
The resolutions were imposed after a similar launch in April 2009. Japan is particularly concerned as the last North Korean rocket was launched over the country.
“I have ordered officials to prepare to deploy the PAC-3 and Aegis warships,” Naoki Tanaka said.
The Japanese parliament also passed a resolution condemning the launch.
South Korea, China and the US have also expressed concern over the planned North Korean launch.
“It would be a grave provocation threatening the peace and security of the Korean peninsula and north-east Asia,” the South Korean foreign ministry said in a statement.
Nuclear envoys from South Korea and Japan held talks in Seoul to work out how they would respond if the launch were to go ahead, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported.
Japan prepares its anti-missile defense systems in response to the planned launch of a North Korean long-range rocket next month
Meanwhile, Chinese state-run news agency Xinhua said Deputy Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun met Pyongyang’s ambassador to express Beijing’s “worry”.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called North Korea’s announcement “highly provocative”.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said any launch could discourage aid donors.
“Such an act would undermine recent positive diplomatic progress and, in its effect on international donors, would likely worsen the humanitarian situation inside the country,” he said in a speech in Singapore.
Last month, Pyongyang agreed to suspend long-range missile tests as part of a deal for the United States to supply 240,000 tons of food aid to North Korea.
It also agreed to suspend uranium enrichment and to allow back UN weapons inspectors as part of the deal.
A US state department spokesperson said it would be “hard to imagine” giving food aid to North Korea, as previously agreed, if Pyongyang went ahead with the rocket launch.
In the launch three years ago, Pyongyang said the satellite made it into orbit and characterized it as a test of its satellite technology.
The move drew condemnation from the US and South Korea and led to the UN resolutions prohibiting the North from nuclear and ballistic missile activity.
Foreign officials said there were no indications that a satellite had reached space and that the launch was a cover for Pyongyang to test long-range missile technology.
North Korea said last week that the launch of a rocket carrying a satellite would take place between 12 and 16 April.
The ”working satellite”, the Kwangmyongsong-3, is an opportunity for ”putting the country’s technology of space use for peaceful purposes on a higher stage”, said a North Korean spokesman.
The rocket would be launched from the Solace Satellite Launching Station in Cholsan county, North Pyongyang province on the country’s west coast.
State media also reported that North Korea has already launched two experimental satellites.
A new wave of “silent camera” applications – some specifically designed for voyeurism – has been blamed for a huge rise in illicit photography in Japan.
Most smartphone cameras have a built-in shutter noise to prevent the camera being used to take pictures without people’s consent.
There were 1,741 incidents last year in Japan, according to a report in Mercury News, with an increase of 60% on the figure five years ago.
The problem is blamed on the rise in “silent camera” apps – including ones which deliberately conceal what the user is doing by putting an innocent-looking email or text message on screen while he or she photographs.
Most smartphone cameras have a built-in shutter noise to prevent the camera being used to take pictures without people's consent
There are dozens of silent camera applications already available on Android Market and iTunes store – and on Android particularly, and several that appear to market themselves as being for stealthy photography.
Mercury News report says: “The latest applications include <<upgraded versions>> that enable people to silently take photos while an email or website is displayed on the phone’s screen to provide cover for the surreptitious picture-taking.”
Japanese academics have called for regulation of silent photography applications – saying that they are being used for crimes.
With Google’s “anything goes” policy on Android, where applications are not vetted before publication on Market, and users can also download apps from elsewhere on the web, it will be very difficult to police.
Most smartphones also include a way of disabling the noise of camera applications even in the built-in apps.
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda has announced that crippled nuclear reactors at Japan’s Fukushima power plant have finally been stabilized.
The earthquake and tsunami in March this year knocked out vital cooling systems, triggering radiation leaks and forcing the evacuation of thousands of people.
Yoshihiko Noda’s declaration of a “cold shutdown” condition marked the stabilization of the plant.
Japanese government says it will take decades to dismantle it completely.
The six-reactor Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant was badly damaged by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami. Blasts occurred at four of the reactors after the cooling systems went offline.
Workers at the plant, which is operated by Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), have been using sea water to cool the reactors. Waste water has built up and some contaminated liquid has been released into the sea.
A 20 km (12 miles) exclusion zone remains in place around the plant.
“The nuclear reactors have reached a state of cold shutdown and therefore we can now confirm that we have come to the end of the accident phase of the actual reactors,” Yoshihiko Noda told a news conference.
“We are now moving from trying to stabilize the nuclear reactors to decommissioning them.
“The Japanese government promises to clarify the roadmap from here and do our utmost, while ensuring we operate the nuclear reactors as safely as possible, to decommission them.”
The “battle is not over”, PM said, adding that the next phase would focus on the clean-up operation, including decontaminating the ground around the plant.
With the reactors stable, Yoshihiko Noda said the government would review the evacuation zones established in the immediate aftermath of the incident.
Earlier this year, the Japanese government said it was aiming for a cold shutdown by the end of the year.
This is where water that cools nuclear fuel rods remains below boiling point, meaning that the fuel cannot reheat.
Tepco has also defined it as bringing the release of radioactive materials under control and reducing public radiation exposure to a level that does not exceed 1mSv/year at the site boundary.
Speaking to cabinet ministers of his nuclear task force earlier on Friday, Yoshihiko Noda said: “We can now maintain radiation exposure at the periphery of the plant at sufficiently low levels even in the event of another accident.”
But some nuclear experts have said that the repairs made to the plant after the accident are makeshift and could break down without warning.
More than 80,000 people had to leave the area, but radiation levels in some places remain too high for them to return home.
Earlier this week, the government said it could take up to 40 years to fully decommission the plant and clean up surrounding areas.
Spent fuel rods and melted fuel inside the reactors must be removed. Waste water must also be safely stored.
Contamination has been found in foodstuffs from the region including rice, beef and fish, while radioactive soil has also been found in some areas.
Some experts have also warned that the plant could be further damaged if a powerful aftershock were to strike.
Engineers are also continuing to encounter new problems – last week Tepco officials confirmed that 45 cu m (1,590 cu ft) of water had leaked into the sea from a crack in the foundation of a water treatment facility.
Japan detected radioactive caesium in concentrations above the safety level in rice for the first time since the nuclear crisis began at the Fukushima plant.
The rice sample came from a Fukushima city farm about 50 km from the plant.
Japanese government is considering banning shipments from the area it was found.
There have been a series of scares over radiation in food in Japan in recent months – in beef, mushrooms and green tea among other products – but never before in the country’s staple, rice.
Japan detected radioactive caesium in concentrations above the safety level in rice for the first time since the nuclear crisis began at the Fukushima plant
Now caesium in concentrations above the official safety limit has been detected in a sample from a farm in Fukushima city.
The rice was being prepared for market, but Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura said none had been sold.
The discovery highlights the difficulty of tracking the radiation which has been spread across eastern Japan by wind and rain.
Local governments in rural areas have set up testing centres to try to ensure contaminated products do not get into the food chain.
Last week the Tokyo Metropolitan Government also began testing samples bought at shops in the capital in an attempt to further reassure anxious members of the public.
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The powerful typhoon Roke has struck disaster-ravaged Japan, bringing heavy rains and floods that have killed four people.
Typhoon Roke is in progress to hit Fukushima, where engineers are still struggling to bring a nuclear plant under control after the March tsunami, with strong concerns that rain could force radioactive water into the sea.
More than a million people were urged to evacuate their homes across Japan; an advisory was later lifted in one area but 330,000 people remain at risk.
More than a million people were urged to evacuate their homes after typhoon Roke hit Japan
Typhoon Roke made landfall on Wednesday afternoon (05:00 GMT), scouring its way up the main island of Honshu, bringing high winds and torrential rain.
Typhoon is tracking a path across Tokyo towards Fukushima prefecture and is then expected to travel up along the north-east coast, which was battered by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami.
Four people have been found dead after heavy rain and flooding in central and western Japan due to the storm’s approach and another two are missing in the central prefecture of Gifu, including a nine-year-old boy.
Hundreds of flights are cancelled and several motorways have been closed.
Toyota, the car maker is suspending production at 11 of its 15 factories.
According to Japan’s Meteorological Agency, “the highest level of caution be used because of the heavy rain, strong wind, and high waves.”
The meteorological agency has also warned of downpours over a wide area of the country on Wednesday, saying some places could be deluged by as much as 50 mm of rain in an hour.
It is the second time in less than a month that Japan is being hit by a typhoon. Typhoon Talas ripped through the west of the country, leaving about 90 people dead or missing.
Typhoon Talas killed at least 18 people and left more than 50 missing after hitting the western area of Japan.
Typhoon Talas came with heavy rain and winds of up to 68 mph after making landfall on Shikoku Island on Saturday.
Talas is the season’s 12th typhoon and is now moving slowly north across the Sea of Japan, according to the Japan’s Meteorological Agency Sunday statement.
Kiho, central Japan on Sunday
The tropical storm Talas had crossed the southern Japanese island of Shikoku and the central part of the main island of Honshu early on Sunday.
But because of the storm’s slow speed, forecasters warned heavy rains and strong winds would continue, increasing the likelihood of more floods and landslides.
Almost 500,000 people in western and central Japan were issued with evacuation orders and advisories, according to Kyodo News agency.
The worst hit areas were in Nara and Wakayama prefectures, with homes swept away by flood waters and landslides.
In Wakayama prefecture, three homes were buried in a landslide and one woman who was rescued later died, four people remained missing and a 14-year old girl was saved from the debris, police said.
Wakayama, an iron bridge over the Nachi River in Nachikatsuura town
According to police, 10 people were dead and 32 people were missing.
In Nara Prefecture, local NHK TV said seven people were missing after their homes were swept away down a river.
According to police, among the dead was a woman who appeared to be in her 30s whose body was found in a river in Ehime prefecture on Shikoku.
In Nara prefecture, a 73-year-old man died after a landslide caused his house to collapse.
TV footage showed a bridge swept away after intense rainfall, which swelled a normally placid river to a raging brown torrent, and people holding umbrellas were seen wading through knee-deep water in city streets.
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Yoshihiko Noda, the former Japan’s finance minister, has become the new prime minister.
Yoshihiko Noda, 54, is the seventh prime minister in six years, inheriting a parliament racked by division, a sluggish economy and a nation struggling to recover from the 11 March tsunami and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear crisis.
The new prime minister’s election, after last week former PM Naoto Kan resignation, was a formality in the lower house of parliament, in which the governing Democratic party of Japan (DPJ) has a comfortable majority.
Yoshihiko Noda, who became the leader of DPJ on Monday, was later approved as prime minister by the upper house too, which the opposition controls.
Yoshihiko Noda, the former Japan’s finance minister, has become the new prime minister
Noda had four competitors for the position DJP’s leader in a contest that exposed deep factional divisions.
The new prime minister may attempt to solve the party inside problems by appointing his opponents to new cabinet posts. There were no indications until now that he was preparing to bring in members of other parties, whose co-operation he needs to end political blockage in the upper chamber.
Yoshihiko Noda highlighted that he is open to the idea of a grand coalition that could see members of the Liberal Democratic party return to the cabinet two years after they were beaten by DPJ.
The new prime minister priorities are to revive the economy, rein in the strong yen and oversee the reconstruction of the tsunami-ravaged north-east coast and the operation to stabilize Fukushima Daiichi.
“I’m aware that we have problems with the strong yen and deflation,” Yoshihiko Noda told media.
“But at the same time, we need to maintain fiscal discipline.”
As finance minister, Yoshihiko Noda approved three interventions in the global currency markets in attempt to weaken the yen.
Possible successors for Japan’s finance minister include Katsuya Okada, the DPJ’s secretary general, and Yoshito Sengoku, a former socialist turned free marketeer.
[googlead tip=”patrat_mare”]Naoto Kan, Japan’s Prime Minister resigned on Friday, fulfilling a promise to critics who blasted what they called his befuddled response to the nation’s dual economic and nuclear calamities triggered by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
In a nationally televised speech, Japanese PM Naoto Kan announced on Friday that he resigned from his position as leader of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) after only 15 months.
After Naoto Kan long-anticipated resignation, DPJ has to select a new leader until Monday — with the winner almost certainly to become Japan’s prime minister.
Naoto Kan‘s departure, after assuming his post in June 2011 following another Japanese power shakeup, means that his successor will become the Japan’s 6th prime minister since 2006.
PM Naoto Kan had promised he would quit once lawmakers passed three key pieces of post-tsunami recovery legislation, the last two of which cleared parliament Friday.
Naoto Kan, 64, is the former finance minister who entered politics after laboring as a Tokyo civic activist.
PM Naoto Kan announced on Friday that he resigned from his position as leader of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan
He initially held the appeal of an outsider who rose up the political ladder on his own merit, rather than merely inheriting political favor as the son or grandson of an outgoing politician.
PM’s approval rating, already near a historic low, plummeted further after what critics call several blunders following the March 11 earthquake that crippled the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
The natural disaster led to the release of deadly radiation into the atmosphere and prompted the evacuation of tens of thousands of nearby residents, many of whom have yet to return to their homes.
A recent poll by Japan’s Kyodo News Agency showed that Naoto Kan’s popularity rating among voters had dropped to just 15.8%.[googlead tip=”vertical_mare” aliniat=”dreapta”]
In the weeks following the meltdown at several reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, critics lambasted Naoto Kan for failing to take charge of the disaster response and leaving too much power in the hands of the Tokyo Electric Power Co., the utility that runs the plant.
Only after the catastrophe Naoto Kan called for alternatives to Japan’s nuclear power policies. While the Kyodo poll showed that 75% of respondents favored a plan to phase out nuclear power, most were determined to be rid of Naoto Kan as well.
Akiko Domoto, a former governor of Chiba Prefecture who worked closely with Naoto Kan within the party said:
“He just didn’t have what it took to be Japan’s top leader.”
“In the party, he did a good job, but as prime minister, he couldn’t talk with the bureaucrats and had little control. Especially after the earthquake, he tried to do everything by himself. We needed a strong leader, and his leadership just wasn’t strong enough.”
[googlead tip=”lista_mare” aliniat=”stanga”]Possible successors for PM position include former Foreign Minister Seji Maehara, Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda and Trade Minister Banri Kaieda.
The winner will face challenges that include rebuilding from the March catastrophe, forging a new nuclear policy and curbing a public debt that’s already twice the size of Japan’s $5 trillion economy. The new PM will also need to mend fences with the U.S. over the relocation of an American military base on Okinawa. Naoto Kan had recently cancelled talks with President Barack Obama over uncertainty about the Japanese leader’s political future.
While many outside experts say that Seji Maehara remains the one to beat, they admit that Japan’s politics are nearly impossible to predict.
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