hello and welcome back to "newsline," i'm shery ahn. let's get started with the head lines. japanese prime minister shinzo abe and south korean president park geun-hye have held their first formal talks with a nudge from the u.s. president. the u.s. government is expected to announce a massive overhaul of the national security agency's surveillance policies. and volunteers in northeastern japan are touching

lost mementos to help remind people of their past. the leaders of japan and south korea have held their first formal talks since they both assumed office. japanese prime minister shinzo abe and south korean president park geun-hye have been caught up in disputes over history and territory. but they sat down together with u.s. president barack obama. nhk world has a report. >> reporter: the leaders of japan and south korea finally agreed to talk on the sidelines of the nuclear security summit in the hague. president obama had pushed both leaders to mend their strained relations before his official visit to the asian region in april. >> this is the first time that the three of us have had an opportunity to meet together and discuss some of the serious challenges that we all face. obviously japan and the republic of korea are two of our closest allies in the world.

>> reporter: president park agreed that it was a significant opportunity for the three to sit down together. >> translator: i believe this is a meaningful chance to have dialogue with president obama and prime minister abe. >> reporter: prime minister abe thanked president obama and greeted president park in the korean language. >> translator: i want to sincerely thank president obama. i am happy to meet president park. very happy to meet you, president. >> reporter: their 50-minute meeting focused mainly on the common security threat in the region, north korea. they discussed the unpredictability of leader kim jong-un, and the country's nuclear and missile development programs. they also discussed humanitarian

issues such as abductions by north korea, both japanese and south korean nationals are among the abductees. abe thanked both leaders for their cooperative efforts to solve the issue. the three leaders agreed that it's vital to strengthen security cooperation on north korea in the region. >> and our trilateral cooperation sent a strong signal to pyongyang that its provocations and threats will be met with a unified response. >> reporter: president park refused to meet with abe in the past over historical issues. this included the so-called comfort women who served as prostitutes during world war ii. but officials say those issues are not raised in the meeting. prime minister abe expressed his hope that relations with south korea can improve. >> translator: i felt that it

was important to meet face to face. i would like this meeting to be the first step to develop forward-looking bilateral relations with south korea. >> reporter: officials say abe hopes this summit will be the first step toward soaring relations between japan and south korea. both governments are preparing for diplomatic, working-level talks. but how this will play out is yet to be seen. nhk world, the hague. south korean defense officials say authorities in north korea have fired off two more ballistic missiles. they say the leadership in pyongyang appears to be reacting to the trilateral summit. a ministry spokesperson says the missiles were lunched from a point near sukchon north of the capital pyongyang. he says they traveled about 650

kilometers, then landed in the sea of japan. the spokesperson says the missiles appeared to have been rodong models with a range of up to 1300 kilometers. japan's defense minister said they could pose a security threat. >> translator: the launch angle suggests that these missiles have the range to reach japan's mainland. >> onodera has ordered his staff to gather more information. u.s. president obama is expected to announce a plan to reformed national security agency's surveillance program. obama says the nsa will stop gathering and keeping a huge volume of personal data. he also said the agency will need to seek court approval each

time it wants to collect that type of information. >> i'm confident that it allows us to do what is necessary in order to deal with the dangers of the terrorist attack, but does so in a way that addresses some of the concerns that people had raised. >> u.s. media say the nsa will likely receive records from phone companies, and hold onto the data for a certain period of time. members of the u.n. human rights office have criticized judicial authorities in egypt. they're speaking out against a decision to sentence more than 500 supporters of ousted president mohamed morsi to death. a court convicted the defendants on monday, for their involvement in an attack on a police station in august. the deputy chief of police was killed. >> people were handed down a death sentence after a trial that just lasted two days, and breached a whole range of basic

fair trial procedures. it's clearly in violation of international law. >> he said many of the defendants were sentenced in absentia. he said the verdict was worrying because authorities have detained several thousand morsi supporters. u.s. officials also criticized the ruling. they said it would be unconscionable for egyptian authorities to carry out the sentences. >> we call on the government of egypt to retrain from politically motivated detention, charges and trials and to ensure all in egypt are afforded the fair trial safeguards they are guaranteed under international law. >> u.s. officials say the case may cause them to reconsider relations with egypt. well, trade officials from japan and australia have been trying to craft an economic partnership agreement for seven years. but they've hit a roadblock in their latest round of talks over the tariffs that japan levies on

beef imports. japanese agriculture minister met australian trade and investment minister in tokyo. he said australia is an important trading partner for japan. he said he hopes the two countries can boost agricultural trade. robb said he wants to make progress before australian prime minister tony abbott visits to japan early next month. japan currently imposes a 38.5% tariff on australian beef. japanese officials propose gradually lowering it to around 30% over ten years. but australian officials want japan to eventually reduce the tariff to about 20%. the two sides couldn't find common ground, and agreed to continue with talks. let's get a check of the markets now. investors in asia took a positive cue from wall street. that's after a u.s. consumer confidence recovered to a level not seen in six years. the nikkei average here in tokyo added 0.4%, it finished at

14,477. investors bought shares because today was the last day to be eligible for dividend payments for this fiscal year. the japanese fiscal year ends on march 31st. in hong kong the hang seng index finished with gains of just about three quarters of a percent. 21,887. financial shares were in demand on the back of a solid earnings report by china's third largest lender. meanwhile the shanghai composite shed about 0.2%, 2,063. investors took profits after the index had risen nearly 4% over the previous three sessions. the international monetary fund is playing a key role in giving financial aid to ukraine. but the united states won't be boosting the financial base of the imf. u.s. senators are discussing a bill submitted by president barack obama that's aimed at assisting ukraine. the legislation includes a billion dollar loan guarantee, and also a freeze of russian

assets. some lawmakers wanted the bill to include a provision that would increase the amount of money that the u.s. gives to the imf. but strong opposition from republicans made them give up that idea. imf managing director christine lagarde says that she's deeply disappointed. people have been taking a closer look at virtual currencies, after a tokyo-based bitcoin exchange went bust. officials at the u.s. internal revenue service now say online currencies will be taxed in the same way as stocks and other forms of property. people use virtual currencies to settle transactions just as they would conventional forms of money. but, irs officials say online currencies like bitcoin should not be treated like cash. the irs officials say profits made when investors trade virtual currencies are taxable, just like profits from stock trading. and they say wages paid in virtual currencies will also be subject to income tax based on

the market value of the currency when it was received. japanese government officials also say virtual currencies aren't the same, as conventional money. they say transactions made with online currencies should be taxed. well, failed bitcoin exchange mtgox has submitted documents to the metropolitan police department here in tokyo. mtgox representative director mark karpeles said in a statement on the company's website that the executives consulted the police about the disappearance of bitcoins. according to the statement they submitted necessary electronic records, and other related documents. karpeles also said mtgox continues to make efforts to clarify facts as quickly as possible, and also to recover from damages. the tokyo-based mtgox filed for bankruptcy protection in japan last month. its executives say the exchange collapsed after hackers stole most of its clients' bitcoins.

now mtgox earlier announced that the total of bitcoins belonging to its customers and the company amounted to $850,000. they say later, though, that over $200,000 bitcoins were, indeed, found. dealers in china had seen fewer japanese cars in their show rooms. buyers have avoided those models because of rising tensions after japan nationalized in 2012. a chain of islands in the east china sea that both china and taiwan claim. but, sales are up this year, by 20%. more now from nhk world's akihiro nikoa. >> reporter: at a sales meeting in february, nissan motor officials in china set an ambitious goal. they will try to sell nearly 20% more cars this year than in 2013. the carmaker has rolled out new suv models to help achieve the target.

the number of chinese people enjoying the variety of recreational activities has been on the rise. last year, suv sales in the country totalled 3 million units. that's 50% year-on-year gain. >> translator: we will be introducing a variety of new models, as part of our strategy. so, please get busy, and do your best. >> reporter: in autumn of 2012, anti-japan sentiment flared up in china after japan nationalized the senkaku islands, dealing a crippling blow to japanese car sales in the country. they tumbled more than 50%. recently, however, the sales have been showing a strong recovery. the number of japanese passenger cars sold in china went up 20%

in the first two months of this year. one reason is the receding impact of the strong bilateral relations on business. >> translator: it doesn't matter who makes a product, as long as its quality is good. >> translator: politics and the economy are two separate things. >> reporter: riding this tailwind, other japanese automakers are also getting aggressive. last june honda released its first model designed exclusively for the chinese market. that helped send the company's new car sales surging more than 30% in the january/february period.

akio fumiri is a car designer who developed this car. he tried to embody the concept of a great power, a word chinese people love. he's also came up with the idea to use the face of dragon he saw in a park in china. for me he tried to express the power and speed of a dragon, soaring into the sky, when he designed the front grill and hood of his new model. >> translator: usually grills stretch all the way across. but on this car both sides are shaped like fangs. >> reporter: since its rollout this model has sold 20% more than the company expected. the factory has been working at full capacity. >> translator: the morale of our people is improving. and they were working only half days for some time, and they were feeling low. now, they are different. >> reporter: honda is aiming to

continue introducing new models to expand its sales in the chinese market. >> translator: i don't think the chinese people are happy with cars that are designed mainly for developed countries. we plan to speed up the production of models our customers here will welcome. >> japanese carmakers in china now appear to be on track for a full recovery. the key to their future growth lies in product tapping the need and expectation of the chinese people, ack shirry mikoda, nhk world, beijing. >> okay, that is going to wrap it up for biz. let's get a check on the markets.

search and rescue efforts are continuing in the u.s. state of washington. a massive landslide has left more than 16 people dead. the mudslide hit in the village of oso on saturday, destroying or damaging losens of buildings. oso is about 90 kilometers northeast of seattle. the search continued on tuesday, with a number of rescuers doubling to 200 in intermittent heavy rain. local authorities and firefighters say they're trying to confirm the number of missing. they say it could be more than 170. notice boards with information about damage from the disaster and names of the missing are put

up in neighboring communities. >> it's pretty much family of real close-knit community so everybody is hurting about something. >> a memorial service for the dead was held at a nearby park on tuesday night. >> workers at the crippled fukushima daiichi nuclear plant have suspended one of their key operations for decommissioning the reactors. they've had some trouble transferring nuclear fuel from a reactor building to a storage pool. workers were about to lift a container for fuel assemblies but an alarm went off and the crane stopped working. the workers have been monitoring radiation levels around the pool. but officials with tokyo electric power company say there's been no change. workers started transferring the fuel assemblies in november. they need to move more than 1500 of them. most of the assemblies are spent and highly radioactive.

reactor number 4 did not suffer a meltdown in the accident three years ago but the building was damaged by a hydrogen explosion. the trouble occurred just as workers restarted a treatment system to remove radioactive substances from wastewater. the system has also been hit by a series of problems. about 400 tons of groundwater flows into damaged reactor buildings, and becomes contaminated every day. volunteers in northeastern japan are restoring some reminders of the past. people up and down the coast are still finding photographs in the debris of the earthquake and tsunami three years ago. the volunteers in a watt to prefecture have collected more than 200,000 pictures. they've been looking for their owners.

>> reporter: this woman's keepsakes were kept away in the tsunami. after the disaster, somebody found the school photo that includes her. >> translator: i was so happy. before this i thought i'd lost everything. >> reporter: photos give hope to disaster survivors. printed pictures from the days before digital are often their most precious record. when someone returns a photo, it's like restoring a family's memories. the photo recovery team works from this volunteer center in the town of yamada. they started immediately after the earthquake. they had a lot of success at first. but over the past year, they've been able to return fewer photos.

this is because people are moving away. around 1500 people have left yamada since the disaster. >> translator: it's been hard to gather information about where the owners of the photos are. >> reporter: staff members guess that more than 120,000 photos are waiting to find their owners. the search continues at this temporary community center in ofunato city. welfare workers try to uncover clues. >> reporter: sato is a supervisor. she joined the project just after the disaster.

her team faces obstacles. public money is about to run out. and even if they fund themselves, they can only continue for a year. >> translator: people are finally settling back down after the disaster. but they don't have their pictures. if they could just see their photos again, i know it would give them strength. every day i grow more determined to return them. >> reporter: as the challenge gets harder the team's belief in the power of photography keeps them going. their dream is to return every single photo and complete the circle of memory.

it's time now for the weather forecast with sayaka mori. >> there has been exceptionally warm over moscow. let's take a look at some video from the city. moscow experienced weather history as temperatures climbed into the immediate teens during the past couple of days. on monday moscow reached 18.8 degrees shattering its all-time high temperature for the month of march. tuesday people in moscow were enjoying the sun and high temperatures reaching 14.3 degrees, a record for that day. but as opposed to the past couple of days it's going to be quite chilly on friday, as well as saturday, because the high temperatures could be dropping into the single digits. but, the average temperatures around 2 degrees so it's actually a bit higher than average. as for the rest of eastern europe and central europe, looking quite warm going in to the next several days. now, as for precipitation,

weather is quite severe over the midsection of the mediterranean countries, es well as the iberian peninsula. it's packing quite strong winds as well and cold air to the north so snow is likely for the mountainous occasions, up to 30 centimeters likely for the pyrenees and waves up to 7 meters likely for the west coast of the iberian peninsula. we're still looking at midwinterlike conditions for these locations. now across the americas, we have been talking about a deadly landslide over western areas of washington state. well, unfortunately stormy weather has been happening from tuesday. that will be continuing in to early next week. as a series of low pressure systems move in to this area, we're talking about heavy rainfall in coastal areas and lots of heavy snow showers for the inland locations, of the northern rockies as well as cascades, may get up to 60 centimeters of snowfall. and on the flip side of the

continent, another heavy snowmaker is affecting the northeastern u.s. and in fact, has dropped about 10 centimeters of snow for the u.s. capital. about 20 centimeters in north carolina. the system is now located here. still packing a lot of energy to cause very strong winds. probably up to 180 kilometers per hour which is as strong as a hurricane, and wiaves are going to be up to six meters at most. it's now affecting the new england states and atlantic canada with blizzard conditions, as well. within the next 24 hours things will be clearing up in the northeastern u.s., and temperatures will be gradually warming up in to the weekend. look at this. washington, d.c. is going to be 4 on wednesday for the high. jumping up to 17 degrees on your friday. warmer than average temperatures. in the mid teens finally in philadelphia on thursday, as well as friday. now finally over asia, quite settled over the northern areas of china, but air qualitywise it's not good. and in fact, air quality is at

the hazardous level in the beijing area at this moment. clear weather for the korean peninsula but rain is coming down over the southern half of japan. thunderstorms likely for the pacific coast. will likely linger into the tokyo area by tomorrow morning. warm weather will continue into the next couple of days across much of east asia. tokyo 23. more like may. and still over 20 degrees going into the rest of the work week. here's the extended forecast.

and that's all for this hour on "newsline." i'm shery ahn. thank you for watching. óñóa7guc

>> as the weather clears over the south indian ocean, the search for the malaysian flight 317 resumes. the jetliner is thought to have crashed 18 days ago. meanwhile anxious family members are meeting today with officials. obama makes his first ever visit to the eu headquarters in brussels, including top european officials cementing the russian takeover of crimea. you might call it cheese diplomacy. the chine