Word: banking
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...Members of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), which controls the upper house of the Diet, complain that Muto, a career bureaucrat who has spent some 35 years in the Ministry of Finance, will be too cozy with Fukuda's administration at a time when the central bank needs to exercise leadership and independence. After growing relatively briskly over the last five years, Japan's economy now appears to be slipping into a malaise and possibly a recession. "Muto is seen to be close to the government and to the Ministry of Finance," says Lehman Brothers chief economist for Japan...
Others see Muto as a steady, experienced hand and a pragmatic choice to replace current Bank of Japan governor Toshihiko Fukui, 72, who whose five-year term ends March 19. The University of Tokyo graduate is "an extremely competent administrator who ensures consistency," says Jesper Koll, Japan director for Singapore-based Tantallon Capital. During his five-year term as deputy governor at the Bank of Japan, Muto, 64, typically voted in line with his boss, Fukui, at policy meetings. Even though Japan faces "stagflation"-a slowing economy combined with higher inflation-Muto isn't expected to do anything radical...
...Japan (LDP), which controls the lower house, and the DPJ, whose members won a surprise majority in the upper house in elections last July. With Fukui's departure looming, politicians have been unable to reach agreement on a successor, with some DPJ lawmakers saying they prefer former deputy Central Bank governor Yutaka Yamaguchi. Business leader Mikio Wakatsuki, chairman of AXA Life Insurance of Japan, told reporters this week that it was "a national disgrace that this issue remains unresolved...
...without a major terrorist attack, and its citizens had permitted themselves the luxury of thinking they were safe. Jerusalemites believed they were protected by the security wall, which separates them from the Palestinians, and by an intelligence apparatus that had cracked apart dozens of terrorist cells in the West Bank. But that illusion was demolished when a Palestinian youth, identified by police as Ala al-Din Abu Dhaim, fired more than 500 bullets at the young students gathered for a celebratory feast...
...nationalist settlers are likely to intensify their opposition to the U.S.-sponsored peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. It will now be harder, if not impossible, for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to comply with U.S. and Palestinian demands to close down illegal Jewish outposts in the West Bank and freeze the expansion of existing settlements...