the flooding in thailand is seriously affecting the people's lives and economy chlt the flooding brought much of the economy to a stand still. about 100 kilometers north of bangkok and 7676 factories have been forced to halt operations because of rising water levels earlier this week. the total damage is expected to reach $940 million.

there is growing concern that the floodwaters could reach bangkok and industrial parts around the city this week. this sparked panic buying by some local resident who is are rushing to stock up on food and bottled water. the thai government ordered that industrial park in central thailand be evacuated. this forced many japanese companies to suspend operations. a technical instructor for auto parts arrived at his factory and saw the gate was close and sandbags were piled up around it. he had to climb up the gates to enter the plant. the evacuation order was issued. he and coworkers had to leave the factory five minutes later. >> i want the floodwaters to recede and return to normal. hopefully we can deliver as many

products as possible when the water is gone. . >> many factories outside the flood zone are also suspending business operations as the suppliers have stopped productions. this maker is supplying imagine parts to toyota, nissan, suzuki and other manufacturers. it has been forced to halt part of the operation since tuesday as the suppliers suspended work following the flooding. >> if we lack one part, we cannot complete the product. we have never experienced such flooding before. so it's very hard to imagine the aftermath. >> eight people have beenilled and one injured in a shooting at a hair salon in the u.s. state of california on wednesday. the incident occurred in the city of seal beach about 50

column teres south of los angeles. police rushed to the scene and confirmed that nine people were shot. among the nine, one person remains in critical condition. six of the victims were employees of the salon. police arrested a man and took him into custody. they found several weapons in his car and are investigating the shooting. the government of myanmar has begun freeing prisoners after it announced amnesty for more than 6,000 detainees. the amnesty covers political and other prisoners. the first of 6,359 detainees walked free after the announcement was made after the president. they filmed several prisoners leading a prisoner. the opposition national league for democracy said they confirmed that 184 political prisoners have been released so

far. >> the move is seen as an attempt to appease prodemocracy groups. they opposed economic sanctions and said the release of prisoners is a condition for listening to sanctions. speaking to reuters news agency after the amnesty was announced, hillary clinton said he was encouraged and added it was too early to announce any steps washington might take in response. >> russian military forces on disputed islands in the northern pacific are being reequipped. it's part of a long-term strategy and comes despite the islands are claimed by japan. the news agency said russia has

begun replacing aging weapons on the islands and it closed as saying new surface to air missiles and tanks have already been deployed. the officials say homes for military personnel are being built. in may, the chief of the general staff said russia will carry out a military build up on e two islands over five years. all euro zone members will likely bailout after all. give us the details. >> i'm sure you remember yesterday slovakia rejected the plan and it is looking more likely that they will endorse it. the main ruling parties have reached a deal with the opposition to approve changes to the euro zone's bailout fund. it's the last of 16 other member nations to endorse the change. the deal on wednesday came the day after parliament rejected

the plan to bolster the fund known as the european stability facility. the opposition approved a greater contribution to the fund in return for an agreement that the ruling parties move forward w in a general election to march of next year. it was originally scheduled for 2014. that compromise means the empowered bailout fund is expected to win consent within this week. ratification by all 17 euro zone countries is needed to take effect. the compromise caused the prime minister her job after a junior coalition party refused to support the new scheme and a confidence vote in the government on tuesday. the european union announced a comprehensive plan to solve the debt crisis. >> it should include all potential systemic banks across all member states.

it should take account of all sovereign debt exposure in full transparency. >> the president of the european commission made the announcement in brussels on wednesday. it follows a bank based in france and belgium and the failure was due to a shortage of capital from a devaluation in the greek government bond holdings. the eu plans that they must be temporarily boosted to enhance ability to cushion losses. banks should use funds from national governments or receive loans from the european financial stability facility which is the euro zone's bailout fund. if they cannot get funding. they plan to cancel dividends and cash bonuses if they cannot secure capital. it calls for loans to greece. this will help the country sustain temporary cash flows and

rebuild the finances. the plan is slated for endorsement at the eu summit meeting on october 23rd. a u.s. trashy official said the european debt crisis is a major risk that could dampen the global economic recovery. the treasury under secretary brainard met with the central bank governor that kicks off in paris on friday. she talked about the measures to boost the cap cal of commercial banks and said the use took similar measures three years ago and proved to be effective. pointing out the risk of the debt crisis, brainard expressed her intention to urge euro zone nations to take prompt action. measures have been studied including resources and raising

the loan ceiling of the monetary fund. brainard gave a warning that such discussions should only be held after making a decision to utilize funds of euro zone countries. time for a check on the markets. the dow jones ended high or news that the european commercial banks will be put on solid footing to deal with further fallout. to see how things are kicking off, let's go to the tokyo stock exchange. some sustained optimism over the issues, how are tokyo markets reacting? >> we are seeing a looft for the nikkei as well as from that weaker yen that we have seen for the gains at the dollar and the ro. let's have a look at the opening levels and at one point in the first few minutes of trading, the nikkei was up over 100 points. yesterday it did fall back a touch and we should keep a close

eye on sectors that despite the positive sentiment may be vulnerable. i'm talking about the auto sector and the excessive floods we have seen in thailand, the likes of honda and toyota due to the extensive floods as well as precision development makers that have exactries there. we will keep track of that during the session. disruptions to the fly chain are the main concerns for the market. having said all of that, let's look at currency levels. that may provide a bit of relief overall to exporters with the dollar and yen around 77 compared to 76 that we have seen the past couple of weeks and the euro yen. have a look at that. 106. that compares to almost the upper 100 levels that touched last week, october 3rd when it hit a low. also we are going to keep track of china and commodity markets as the price of copper and

metals may be affected after trying to reveal a bigger increase in the copper inventories that may affect such sectors as electrical products and wire and construction sectors as well. let's not forget there is a speddy stream of earnings out of the u.s. and we will focus on sectors there such as banking and jpmorgan chase due out with earnings followed by citigroup and morgan stanley and others in the days to come. that will be a focus as well. for now, the nikkei and the topics into the positive this thursday. back to you in the studio. >> thanks a lot. that was the tokyo stock exchange. let's get a look at other market figures now.

. >> that is all for this hour in business news. officials in tokyo are thinking ahead to the next possible disaster. one of the city's wards has passed by law requiring companies to shelter employees in the event of a major earthquake. it's in response to what happened after the march 11th disaster. trains stopped running and thousands of commuters couldn't get home. the assembly on wednesday adopted the ordinance laying out the responsibilities of companies to help minimize confusion. they have many small and

mid-size businesses. they said companies should prevent employees from leaving and take in commuter who is have no way of going home. companies are urged to stock food and water for workers. experts warn that if an earthquake occurs beneath tokyo, people walking home could be injured by fires and collapsed buildings. why are company being asked to shoulder a burden? how they are looking for the newly discovered problem. > the leader of a community group, after the march 11th quake, he watched people stream into a square in front of the station. >> the companies made the employees leave office. i never have seen such a large

number of people here before. >> an hour after, commuters filled the square and they couldn't go home because systems had been disrupted. people who couldn't get into the square started to worry that members of the community would be left without a place to go. >> people arrived later and were turned down and we need to evacuate to somewhere as well. >> about 90% of people who cannot go home are company employees. that prompted thome ask businesses to play a central role in coping with commuter who is would be stranded. there is a problem. some businesses cannot keep their employees at the office because of a lack of space or other reasons. at this travel agency, one third

are women. on the day of the earthquake, many male employees spread newspapers on the floor and spent the night in the office. space was one issue and privacy was another. >> there things that we don't want to show, even to the coworkers. i assume the feel being are especially strong among women. >> while enforcing the by law, they will negotiate with companies individually to craft specific plans to how they will cooperate. >> it's not only businesses or the wood that should be involved.

everybody should work together to deal with stranded commuters. >> it's the first ward to introduce a measure by asking the firms to deal with the future disasters or possible future disasters. officials are conducting more soil tests. they defected it on the roof of an apartment building. they are located about 50 kilometers from the plant. they had 80 times the government set limit was found last month in samples of sediments collected from roadside digis. the city later removed the sediment, but the city decided to retest the samples from the roadside for radioactive requests of a local resident.

they said a private testing institution detected 195 bequerels per kill gramm gram. they said the this can accumulate and poses a cancer risk. they conducted only a few checks outside the prefecture because the amounts detected within the prefecture were small. high levels of radiation have also been detected in southwestern tokyo. a roadside reading earlier this month showed 2.707 microsieverts an hour. the reading was near an elementary school. >> translator: i pass here every day and play in the park every day. it's a surprise. >> the ward is more than 200

kilometers from the disabled power plant. what has people concerned is that the radiation levels were slightly higher than the reading in the village that inside the government designated evacuation zone. they are less than 50 kilometers from the power plant. they spend to cower out more studies. two innovators and an artisan

have brought their new look product to the show room of a tokyo department store. as we see in this report, the customers are dazzled. a tapestry adores the department store. this work was designed to help people seek high quality krafs machineship. the use of paper is declining and we want people to look at the work and rediscover the value of this paper. >> for the last 1500 years, this has been a hub for

craftsmanship. legend has it passed on the design skill of paper making. because of the quality is so high, it is used for formal traditional products like the sliding doors and official documents. the tuchl has been in business going back more than 500 years. they now work on furnishings for international customers. these developments have been topular in europe and the u.s. >> we will make new interior furnishings with the paper. >> they're visit what they commissioned to make for the department store in tokyo.

he specializes in making papers for sliding doors. he doesn't snead to drop. he uses the method passed down for many generations. months can go by with no order for traditional paper, the main source of income. as demand is falling, he accepted it to make tapestrieta. >> honestly i would rather make sliding door paper. i want to pass on what i make to future generations. we have a responsibility to teach the techniques. >> they said the support store is holding new products.

they spend a hole night on it. this symbolizes the truth. >> good, i like natural products. . >> it's fantastic. a lot of work gone into it. maybe the stars and that sort of thing. >> we have been around for 1,500 years because we adapted to the change in times. it might be an exaggeration to say it, but we are doing it on behalf of japan. i want to do all that i can.

the sound business sense ensures that they have a place in the modern times. >> just beautiful there. together with professional designers in tokyo, they are developing new paper products for interior design. now let's take a look at the global weather forecast. >> hello and time for the weather update. let's check off with southeast asia. the tropical depression is now moving away from the northern philippines, but bringing heavy rain as well as strong winds. this system could affect the

peninsula next week. we have another tropical depression that is spreading heavy rain across the peninsula and the south coast of china. the risks of flooding in and landslides remain high here. as for china, central and southern parts are experiencing moderate rain. it will spread to the southern parts of the peninsula as well as western japan by friday. you may see scattered thunderstorms on thursday. as for temperatures, we are expecting 23 degrees and 22 in seoul. it will be chilly with only 5 degrees. as for the americas, we have a tropical depression across southern mexico. as much as the central part of the americas. lots of heavy rain will affect across this area for the next several days. as for north america, it is wet across the portions.

we have a couple of systems and the heaviest rain can be solved across the mississippi valley and there is a possibility of thunderstorms, large hail as well as damaging winds across the lower part. the rain will develop into thursday. it stays dry across much of the west. in british columbia, you may see heavy snow in the higher elevations. as for temperatures for thursday, we are expecting 31 degrees in houston and up to 37 in los angeles. it stays seasonal in vancouver with 14 degrees and 10 degrees in winnipeg. now for europe, a long rain band is across continental europe bringing heavy rain and scattered thunderstorms. the heaviest rain can be found across central germany and the rain will move southward and reach italy and the baltics in the next 24 hours. a lot of thunderstorms are still erupting across northern turkey.

the stormy conditions should ease as we head to thursday afternoon. heavy rains still continuing across the northwestern corner of russia and it will continue to be wet for the next couple of days. as for temperatures, we expect a 31 degrees in madrid and 33 in liis is chilly in the north. 8 degrees in stockholm and the same goes for moscow. 13 degrees in and the same goes for vienna. here's your extended forecast.

that concludes this edition of "newsline" in tokyo.