currency while stone. the japanese yen passes a benchmark against the u.s. dollar. they are signing signs to right their economy. it's the first time in more than four years that the yen has tumbled to those levels.

prime minister abe ushered in the new year promising to drastically change japan's economic policy. his fight against deflation caused the yen to plunge and the dollar to rally. finally the dollar tipped over the 100 yen mark. traders saw encouraging signs about the u.s. economic recovery. applications for unemployment benefits slid unexpectedly. traders consider the 100 yen level to be a psychological barrier. now that it's past that some think it will weaken even further. we've been wondering when this will happen. >> many of us have been on standby for this day. you might remember just last month the dollar hit 99.95 then it backed off begin. since breaking through 100 in new york overnight that level

has been maintained. the focus going forward will be one, will this continue and two how will this impact corporate earnings in the future and will we hear any comments from overseas monetary officials. we'll have to wait and see. let's get more details on market moves. we'll go to ramin. good morning. >> we have hit the key levels on the dollar yen. a lot of market players waiting for that. waiting four years and one month. the key level was anticipated by the markets since the weakening trend of the yen began. really interestingly it's taken over five weeks since that bank of japan meeting in april when it put in place aggressive monetary easing yen.

let's have a look at stocks. that's why we're here. the nikkei and the topix in positive. we're having a bit of a mixed picture if you consider the u.s. markets and its slightly lower after hitting record closing highs in recent days. we're seeing the yen weaken further which should boost exporters. also with key earnings results out of the way markets want to digest some of those numbers. >> we had a couple of big names this week. toyota on wednesday, sony on thursday. what's the reaction? >> big reaction and positive numbers overall. we didn't see that with toyota.

shares of sony fell around 1% yesterday before the announcement after the bell on thursday which showed it returning to profit for the first time in five years and an improved outlook as well. sony shares are bid up right now meaning it's going to be in the positive. we'll get the exact numbers later on. nissan will be coming out with earnings numbers later today after the markets close on friday. markets also will be looking to the g7 meeting in britain. a lot of focus there. also from the political events surrounding the g7. definitely a positive start for the nikkei and the topix. back to you. >> sounds od. currency traders turned to the yen as a safe haven during the global financial crisis. they saw a safe asset in a time when those were rare.

>> reporter: the yen gained further ground after the disaster that hit north eastern japan two years ago. investors believed trillions of yen would be needed to pay for the reconstruction. the debt crisis in europe sent the yen still higher. in october 2011, the currency hit 75.32 yen to the dollar. then last november the tide changed. the prime minister dissolved the lower house of the diet. party leader abe advocated bold, monetary easing. expectations spread that a change of power would prompt the bank of japan to get more money flowing through the economy. traders reacted by selling off the yen. abe came to power in late december. a few weeks later the yen weakened further hitting 90 y to the dollar for the first time in more than two and a half

years. prospects elsewhere accelerated the trend. investors saw better things ahead for the u.s. economy and grew less worried about the debt crisis in europe. in march an advocate of aggressive monetary easing took over as governor of the bank of japan. investors thought he would push forward easing. two weeks later he followed through. the measures he took exceeded market expectations. once again investors sold off the yen. in april, financial leaders from the group of 20 economies gave a nod to japan's bold easing and said it was not aimed at devaluing the currency. they took it as a cue for further yen selling. >> group of seven finance figures are joining us close to london. they are start the discussions

friday on how to stimulate growth while maintaining fiscal consolidation. they'll talk with counterparts about monetary easing policies employed in certain industrialized nations. a big global cash influx could lead to inflation. japanese and italian leaders have applied tentative stimulus policies. some participants are said to question whether austerity is good for europe but all representatives will be looking for a common ground for global recovery. the dollar and the nikkei keep going higher. i'll leave you with a check on markets.

gunmen in pakistan have abducted the son of a former prime minister. they attacked a campaign rally in the south. galani was meeting with supporters. he's the son of former prime minister. he this say they killed at least one of his aides before they kidnapped him. he is with the ruling party and is running for the provincial assembly of punjab. thursday was the last day of

campaigning for the election. they attack parties that cooperate with u.s. led anti-terror groups. now the violence has overshadowed the run up to saturday's vote, but it sn't drowned outhe issues, whic include everything from poverty to pakistan's place in the world. >> reporter: his party pack has positioned itself more than any other party as anti-american.

he's technically opposed to the ongoing air strikes by u.s. drones flying over pakistan. >> translator: drone strikes are a complete violation of human rights. they're assassinating large numbers of innocent civilians. >> reporter: over the recent years, the united states has dramatically increased the use of unmanned drones to target muslim extremists in pakistan. it has fueled strong resent. in the population. this city is about 150 kilometers from the iran border. it's now home to many refugees who were driven away from areas because of the constant threat from the sky.

among them is this man. he lost three sons and one brother to a drone strike four years ago. they were all killed while attending a relative's funeral. >> translator: my grief is beyond words. and most frustrating of all is that there's nothing i can do. >> reporter: he sees his moment for justice in the upcoming election. more people are turning to the pare because of the increasing number of victims of drone strikes. >> translator: drone strikes kill innocent people, including children. everyone is against them. >> translator: mr. hong is a new star in the political world. i hope things will change if he takes power. >> translator: the government now is given priority to the u.s. but we are the victims of these

attacks. >> reporter: hong and his followers -- >> this war has created more extremism. we will not take part in this insanity of military operations. and we will have truth and reconciliation with our own tribal people. >> reporter: on the other side of the debate is the ruling people's party which has supported cooperation with the united states for the past five years. former minister of foreign affairs says pakistan's relationship with the u.s. is crucial toounter the influence of extremists. she believes hong's opposition to the use of military force is unrealistic.

>> unfortunately, the political party that you mention seemed to be providing ways for the terrorists to dance around freely and we believe is not good for pakistan. because pakistan needs leaders which are able to be strong on the question of terrorism. >> reporter: if the people's party retains power, then the status quo with the u.s. is likely to remain. however, should the moment for justice gain significant ground, the future of ties with washington will hang in the balance. nhk world, islamabad. khan is recovering from injuries from a fall on tuesday. the death toll from the collapse of a clothing factory building in bangladesh has now topped

900. the government has decided to inspect garment factories across the country for construction flaws. 912 people have been confirmed dead in the collapse of the eight story building outside dhaka two weeks ago. more than 2,400 people have been rescued. many of them are injured. the police have arrested the building's owner on suspicion of keeping the building open even though they knew the building was unsafe. the government has closed 18 factories that failed to meet safety standards. a fire broke out at another garment factory in dhaka on wednesday night, killing eight people. the owner was among the dead.

crews used to aircraft for search and rescue missions. japanese leaders hope to produce more of the planes than to drive down costs. indian leaders have shown interests to respond to accidents. they want to crack down. they are discussing the plan. officials with japan's defense ministry say they can export the plane without violating the ban on armed shipments. they would need to remove radar and other equipment. fishing crews are heading out to stormy waters. they will be working in japan's island in the east sea. taiwan and china claim them.

fishing crews headed to the area. they reached an agreement last week. japanese fishermen fear the counter parts will go outside the designated zone. they are sending ten surveillance shipso tharea. that's twice the usual numr. chinese leaders are trying to may a role in the middle east peace process. xi jinping met with benjamin netanyahu. he talked about their ties with abbas. he said israel should stop settlements. netanyahu replied that israel also wants peace. he said he hopes communication with china will remain open.

the elder brother of a chinese activist says he was assaulted by two men on thursday in a string of attacks against his relatives. he's now in the united states. u.s. officials are concerned about the reported harassment against his family. he escaped house arrest in the chinese province in april last year. his elder brother lives there. he said since the departure his relatives have been harassed by government authorities. he said it's intensified since mid-april. >> translator: the government's harassment against me has not

stopped but escalated. >> officials expressed concerns over the lastest report of harassme harassment. >> we ask you to treat them fairly and with dignity. >> the secretary of state john kerry wrote to chinese officials conveying u.s. concerns. cartoon characters are one of the pillars of japanese pop culture. marketers use them all the time to promote their products. now some foreign embassies in tokyo are drawing on the characters to make their own pitches. they tried to market their countries and attract tourists. >> reporter: in the lobby you'll meet fintan. he's dressed as a lion. that's because there's a lion on the national code of arms.

he's a long way from home. this tweet highlights the magic magical aurora borealis. younger japanese have taken to fintan. he has 90,000 twitter followers. >> we have more followers than facebook and other embassies. it's a good achievement. >> reporter: other countries are also catching on. the staff is excited. the characters promote regional location. they want the mascot to charm what users and enhance the country's image.

staff launched a contest on facebook and other social media asking what kind of character the country should use. they received 450 submissions in just over two months. >> you can take this one and make that out of it. i don't know what japanese people would like or not. maybe for israeli seem a bit weird for this kind of character. >> this is definitely for japanese. >> reporter: this character inspired by the national bird. >> i would never, never understand japanese way of thinking. >> reporter: the contest has so far attracted more than 2,000 likes on facebook where users are encouraged to vote for their

favorite mascot. >> the japanese people might think of israel as a dangerous place, which it's not. we just thought of platform of the japanese pop culture in order to get the japanese interested about israel. >> reporter: another country coping with conflict is afghanistan. embassy staff use humor in their online videos. afghanistan exercises are a parody of a famous sketch by a japanese duo. embassy staff wants japanese and foreign students make a video each month. they are uploaded to you tube. they can be easily watched on a

smart phone. they're attraction is that they are funny. officials at the afghan embassy say they want to promote in japan aspects of their country other than war and terrorism. >> we can change the idea of what people consider afghanistan to be. we know when we bring people to the embassy their thinking changes a lot. >> reporter: the world may be differences still count.onal staff are finding new ways to express their country's charm. time now to get a check on the weather. residents in tokyo dealt with some warm weather yesterday. >> it's going to be warm as

well. people in the midsection of japan needed ways to cool down. it jumped up 25 degrees in just oneday. some people enjoyed eating ice cream to celebrate ice cream day. it was the day that ice cream arrived in japan about 150 years ago. some location in japan will have another seasonally hot day. see clouds moving in from the an west starting to cover western japan. rain is not going to last long.

clear conditions should return to western japan by tomorrow. however, southern china is a different story. persistent rain can be found across southern china again. the heaviest rain will be found in the area in hong kong today. the ground is already very well soaked. additional rain will raise the risk of flooding as well as land slides. through the north of china looking dry and temperatures are on the rise once again. 30 degrees in beijing on friday and 31 for you on saturday. shanghai looking at 31 degrees on sunday. in north america then,here are two areas of severe weather. one in the south over the arklatex region. hail the size of a chicken egg can be found and tornados cannot be ruled out into thursday evening. and to the north, severe

thunderstorms may occur into the next several hours. these systems will head to the east as we head into the weekend. out to the north, scattered thunderstorms in the northwestern u.s. it's still like winter there. out towards the west, looking dry. very warm for this time of year. 26 degrees in seattle. that's 8 degrees higher than where it should be. 21 for vancouver with plenty of sunshine, but cooling down in chicago as well as toronto. meanwhile, locally heavy rain will persist across the british isles and lots of hail, risk of hail, thunderstorms and heavy rain will drift toward the east over the continent. temperatures over central and

eastern europe are on the warmer side. 26 degrees for you in warsaw. 25 in moscow and 28 in kiev. warm weather will continue into the weekend. on the other hand, cooling down to only 17 in london and paris. here's your extended forecast.

of "newsline". i'm catherine kobayashi in tokyo. we'll see you again at the top of the hour.

captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> woodruff: a massive immigration reform plan survived a first day running the congressional gauntlet, but it faces determined opposition in the weeks to come. good evening, i'm judy woodruff. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. on the "newshour" tonight, we examine the politics and the sticking points over border security and more. >> woodruff: then, two takes on the story of the ohio women kept captive for a decade. ray suarez gets the latest on the arraignment of the suspect and looks at the road ahead for the victims. >> brown: we return to