it's 7:00 p.m. on a tuesday here in japan. i'm james tengan in tokyo. welcome to "newsline." according to members of south korea's party, their embattled president has agreed to step down. park reportedly disclosed her

decision on tuesday afternoon when she met with senior party officials. last week the party floated a plan for park to step down so an election could be held in june. the hope was the plan would appease alienated party members who want her out of office while allowing park to save face. >> translator: president park said she has been thinking she should dually accept what is decided by the party. >> boosted by strong public support, the opposition is still pursuing an impeachment motion. it's likely it'll pass on friday with support from the anti-park faction. if impeached, she'll be suspended from her duties until the constitutional court rules. park told lawmakers she'll calmly await for the ruling. shinzo abe will soon become the first sitting president to visit pearl harbor.

later this month, abe and president barack obama will pay their respects to the victims of the attack. nhk world has the reaction to the planned trip. >> translator: i want to reaffirm with president obama what we have done over the past four years. i also want to use the opportunity to convey to the world the significance of further strengthening our alliance. >> reporter on monday, he will vistt the place where the war began 75 years ago. december 7th, 1941. the now defunct imperial japanese navy carried out a surprise attack on the u.s. base in pearl harbor. it killed more than 2,000 americans and pulled the u.s. into world war ii. japan's top government spokesman said the late december visit is to pray for the souls of the victims. he says it's not for an apology. abe says the trip will symbolize

reconciliation between the two countries. in may, obama made his own symbolic gesture. he became the first u.s. sitting president to visit hiroshima, where american forces dropped an atomic bomb in 1945. >> seeing the japanese prime minister and the american president standing side by side in pearl harbor just a couple of weeks after the 75th anniversary of that attack, i think will be similarly powerful. >> reporter: u.s. veterans who survived pearl harbor had been calling for a visit from the leader of japan. >> it is remarkable for japan and the united states to reach that point. >> before they're separated. they worked out smoothly. it took time.

>> reporter: japanese survivors of the atomic bombings have mixed views about the trip. >> translator: what a breakthrough. the president and prime minister will meet in hawaii and discuss peace. that's what people on both sides have been hoping for. >> translator: i think the action is a reciprocation of obama's visit to hiroshima. i think what both sides need to clearly understand is that the attack on pearl harbor didn't target civilians but the ones on hiroshima and nagasaki did. >> reporter: while the trip will be seen by many as symbolic, some observers say the timing is strategic. it will take place right before the inauguration of donald trump. they see it as a continuation of abe's efforts to win over the president-elect, who has threatened to change bilateral

relations. first came abe's trip to new york one week after the election. now a visit to pearl harbor. japan is now one step closer to letting people try their luck at casinos in the country. gene otani joins us with more on that and other stories. >> japan's lower house has passed a bill to legalize casino gambling in the country. the legislation is designed to promote integrated resort facilities that have shopping centers, international conference spaces, and casinos all in one spot. the bill won majority support from members of the main governing liberal democratic party and the opposition innovation party. members of the junior coalition partner komeito were divided on the vote. some opposition parties did not take part in the vote and walked out. they said the way the ldp conducted the vote was inappropriate, and they could not approve it. the bill was sent to the upper house. the ldp hopes to pass the bill by wednesday next week.

japanese government and ruling party officials want companies in the country to keep up with global competition. their latest effort is additional tax breaks for businesses that invest in rnd. the scheme is to give corporations the treatment if they increase investment on experiments and research. big firms would get a tax credit of anywhere between 6% to 14% of spending in those areas. the incentives would be bigger for small and medium sized firms. credits would run from 12% to 17 percent. the rate would depend on overall sales and the spending on applicable research over the years. the officials are planning to include the measures in tax reforms for fiscal 2017. checking the markets, tokyo stocks ended higher, tracking gains in europe and the u.s. uncertainty hit investors right after italian voters rejected

forms in sunday's referendum, but those concerns have since receded. here's more from the tokyo stock exchange. >> investors are again embracing risk. traders don't see the vote as being disruptive to the status quo in the way that brexit and u.s. elections were as far as the eu's political future is concerned. tokyo's benchmark nikkei snapped two days of losses. the nikkei 225 added almost half a percent this tuesday, december 6th, closing at 18,360. the broader topix gained 0.7%. financial shares were sold off on monday. they were being bought backck o tuesday. nomura holdings advanced nearly 3%. mizuho financial group advanced around 2%. tokyo electric power traded higher on a report it is looking for partners in the industry to cut costs on nuclear power generation and electricity transmission. looking at currencies, the euro

has bounced back against the dollar after plunged to the 105 level in the immediate aftermath of italy's referendum. investors are now looking ahead to thursday when the european central bank convened and could possibly extend its quantitative easing program beyond march. we'll see if the gains in the euro will hold. the bullish mood spread to much of the asia pacific region. seoul's cospi climbed 1.3%. hong kong advanced 0.75%, led by banking shares. australia rising half of 1%. high commodity prices supported the gains. the central bank held its key interest rate steady as expected. the shanghai composite down by a fraction. 3199 the closing number there. a recent move to tighten rules against aggressive buyouts by

insurance funds dampened sentiment. japanese government officials say tax revenue for the current fiscal year ending in march will be nearly 2 trillion yen lower than their initial figure. that's about $17 billion. the officials had previously said tax revenues would come to about 57.6 trillion yen or $506 billion. now they say they're preparing to revise the figure down to the upper 55 trillion yen level. the revision is due to the stronger yen hitting earnings of many companies and corporate tax revenue hasn't been increasing in line with projections. tthe officicials will formulate plan to issue additional bonds to make up for the shortfall in the third supplementary budget planned for later this month. here's some of the other business stories we're following. the average monthly salary of japanese workers rose for the second consecutive month. workers earned about $2,340.

that's up 0.1% in yen terms from a year earlier. wages adjusted for inflation were uunchanged due to a slight rise in prices. amazon has started operations at its first fulfillment center in japan equipped with robots. the mobile transport units deliver shelves of products weighing more than 300 kilograms. the facility is the company's main distribution center in the metropolitan area. and while some firms are going with high-tech robots, others are using mother nature to grow their business. people in a major coral producing region of japan are looking at man made waves to sustainably cultivate its natural treasure in deep sea waters so they can continue to make their unique and distinct jewelry.

>> reporterer: jewelry c coral s in a wide range of colors, from pale pink to deep, rich red. much of it comes from one prefecture in japan. visitors flock to local shops like this one. >> translator: the designs are wonderful. i just love looking at them. >> reporter: but in october, local coral producers got some alarming news. it came from a meeting of signatories to the convention on international trade and endangered species. concerned about the global decline in coral reefs, the parties decided to study the impact of commercial harvesting. about $52 million worth was harvested in 2015. officials there had already imposed strict regulations on coral harvesting. it's confined to the areas shown

in pink on this mapap. the totatal haul has been limi to 750 kilogramss per yeaear. but local coral producers are worried the decision could shrink that amount even further. >> translator: i think more restrictions would hit the prefecture's coral industry hard. >> reporter: producers are faced with a tough question. how can they keep the local coral industry alive without threatening the future of the reefs. so they're exploring methods to bring jewelry coral artificially. they've enlisted the support of marine life experts at the biological institute. they conduct experimented on artificial breeding. >> translator: the most important element to these small flower-like parts on the ends of the branches. >> reporter: corals havee larg

branches with tentacles on the ends. they decided to use these ends of branches to breed coral. he believed they would regenerate after being cut. local coral harvesters provide the raw materials. they remove the ends in order to make the shape more uniform. back in the lab, he applies an adhesive to the branch end. he then attaches them to artificial reefs and drops the reef to the sea floor about 100 meters below. six months later, the branch ends show fresh signs of life. this gives him cause for hope. >> translator: i think this will contribute greatly to preserving and increasing jewelry coral

resources. harvesting coral is a tradition. i hope what i'm trying to do will help keep it going. >> reporter: the people here are turning to artificial breeding to ensure the survival of a local industry, but what they learned could also help preserve a species. >> you can catch our report again online together with a full transcript. look for nhk world and business wrap. that's a look at business news. i'll leave you with the markets.

japanese personnel taking part in an african peace keeping mission will receive a pay bump. the e self-defense forces unit south sudan is permitted to use weapons if it's tasked to rescue u.n. personnel. team members now earn about $140 a day on top of their salary. they'll get an extra $70 a day when ordered to do additional missions.. >> translator: we made the change in light of south sudan's environment anand the special nature of the duty. the risk was not a factor in the decision because all sdf duties involve risk. >> the unit will join the mission from monday. a japanese seismologist has warned that last month's earthquake that triggered a tsunamami off the coast of fukushima could have been much more powerfuful, and he's calli on authoritieies to improve the way they estimate the risk.

this professor says a 30-kilometer stretch of the fault shifted during the magnitude 7.4 quake. he says he believes if the entire fault had shifted, the tremor would have been much more powerful. he warns part of the fault is still close to the shore and could trigger another powerful quake. the fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant was crippled by a massive quake and tsunami in 2011. its operator has estimated that two fault lines in the area could cause a quake with the magnitude of up to 7.1. he says november's ququake was actually much stronger than that. >> translalator: i think a faul could expose the seabed.d. we should studydy it and need t review t the way we collect dat and how we assess it. i believe that could improve our analysis.

>> a spokesperson for tepco says the utility will review its estimates if new information comes to light. rush hour traffic was brought to a halt at a tokyo intersection on tuesday morning because of a car accident. four people were injured, one of them seriously. >> reporter: the taxi jumps on to the sidewalk. many people were walking at the time of the accident. this is a very busy area inn tokyo. right nowow policemen are guidi traffic. >> police say video from the taxi's dash cam shows it collided with a nearby vehicle while trying to change lanes. the collision forced the taxi on to the sidewalk. the injured were taken to hospital. visitors from around the world come to japan each year to soak up its bath culture. with the 2020 tokyo olympics on

the horizon, some officials feel there could be confusion on the way to the tub. so they're proposing a change. nhk world tells us more. >> reporter: thousands of tourists come to japan each year for a long soak at one of these hot springs. but the government thinks finding them can be confusing. so what do visitors think the logo means? >> what do you think it is? >> ramen. >> what did you say? >> coffee. >> reporter: to cut down on confusion, the government is proposing a new sign. this one has people in the tub. >> i think this is more explicit of what it says. this is hard to read. it's a nice logo, but it doesn't say what it is. >> it's clearer. this one is clearer.

definitely. this looks like hot soup, coffee, or you know, maybe a bowl of noodles steaming. this actually shows people and heat. >> reporter: but not everyone is big on the government's take. many japanese who live around hot spring regions like the current logo and its more than 350-year history. >> translator: i was growing up looking at this logo all the time. as a local, i prefer the original sisign. >> reporter: on tuesdsday, government officials met to discuss changes to 90 signs they feel are confusing. they also got input from groups about the proposals. >> translator: we want foreign visitors to know that we've had this logo for centuries in japan, and it's very important for us. >> reporter: the push to change signs is an effort to make japan

more visitor friendly for the 2020 tokyo olympics. a decision is expected by march. nhk world, tokyo. it seems there's another move to counter china's maritime advances in the disputed south china sea. nhk has learned that indonesia will label the section of sea surrounding its natuna islands as the north natuna sea on its mapsps. indonesiaian government sources ttell us the name will be used n the country's atlases startinng nexext year. the isndnd's residentnts alread ususe it, but i it's nevever ap onon the country'y's maps. it willl cover waters around th islands, including the countrys exclusive economic zone. part of that zone overlaps with china's claim over most of the sea. tensions in the area have risen between the two countries this

year. indonesia has boosted activities to seize chinese fishing boats allegedly operating there illegally. it is also proceeding with a plan to deploy fighter planes and missile units on the islands. thailand's new king has led a ceremony observing the birthday of his father who died in october after a reign of seven decades. the king ascendeded the throne just last week. the annual event took place at the royal palace in bangkok. the late king's birthday was on monday. crowds gathered to see the new king preresiding over ththe eve and the buddhist ceremony was broadcast across the nation. >> translator: i believe people will continue to revere the royal family. nothing will change from before. >> translator: the new king knows what to do. we just follow. >> as the new king settles in,

the military-led interim government is tightening control of free speech by shutting down websites critical of the royal family. u.s. president-elect donald trump has met with former vice president al gore. they talked about one of the issues gore is most passionate about and that is climate change. they met at trump tower in new york. gore has been campaigning for years to lower carbon emissions, and that won him the nobel peace prize in 2007. >> i had a lengthy and very productive session with the president-elect. >> he says he also spoke with trump's daughter ivanka. she has expressed support for efforts to stop climate change. during his election campaign, trump referred to global warming as a hoax. he threatened to pull the u.s. out of the paris agreement on cutting emissions. but in a recent interview, trump indicated he might be open to joining the battle against

global warming. i'm of the opinion that all you have to do is take a look at weather reports to see it's not a hoax. we're coming to you live from tokyo where it's currently partly cloudy with a temperature reading of 52 degrees fahrenheit. jonathan oh joins us with a world weather update, starting with spain, which saw severe conditions the past few days. >> well, as we go forward in time, i think we're going to see much more calmer conditions, but we did see through monday the lingering low-pressure system that brought not only stormy weather for sunday but also into monday. that caused some serious problems in the southern areas of the country. let me show you some video, give you a better idea of the situation. heavy rain and strong winds continue to hit the southern coastlines of spain monday. since december 1st, the area had aboout 95 millimeters of rainfall. just to give you an idea of how much that is, the monthly average rainfall in december is 99.6 millimeters. so we're seeing almost the entire amount there. look at all the mud located

because of the flooding. emergency services said they responded to about 1300 incidents on sunday. schools in the area were closed on monday. residents were pretty busy trying to clean out the mud and the water. you see the furniture that's all being messed up because of the flooding conditions. now, ththe low-pressure sysmm is startrting to fall apart, but nevertheless the moisture is heading toward the east. that's bringing a lot of rain into italy. as we go throughout the day tuesday, be on the lookoutut fo some dnching rainfall. toward the north, snow and windy conditions into finland. we saw strong and powerful winds on monday. may also be the case as we go through tuesday. 15 in madrid. 18 in lisbon. cloudy and increasingng raininy conditions as we go through tuesday into wednesday. snow into moscow and kiev forr the next workday. as you look at the forecast for north america, i want to draw

your attention down toward the u.s. deep south. monday was a wet day. we saw temperatures a bit on the warmer side. another low-pressure system is departing from texas. that will push into the eastern seaboard. that's going to bring a chance for some rain and maybe even some thunderstorms. so severe thunderstorms are possible in the northern portions of florida and into places like georgia. further toward the north because of the cold air, we may see freezing rain. that's going to create nasty problems into the mid-atlantic states possibly. mixed precipitation along the great lakes and toward canada. we have another system that will bring snowy conditions into places like denver. 3 degrees in seattle with snow in the forecast for tuesday. as we look at the forecast down toward the southeastern portions of australia, we've been watching as waves of moisture have been moving through the area. sydney and melbourne seeing that type of situation. we go through the next 48 hours. another system will be moving in, which means rain and

thunderstorms continue to be a part of the forecast. here it is. wednesday, thursday, friday, thunderstorms in brisbane. melbourne starts to pick up on the wet weather toward the weekend. as we look at what's happening in japan, very windy today. we're seeing a low-pressure system trying to depart. the high pressure is filtering in. that's driving in northerly winds. plenty of sea-effect snow taking place in the northern areas of the country. cooler temperatures are on the way. we're looking at highs dropping significantly down to around 10 degrees for tokyo as we go into wednesday. snow into akita. hope you have a good day wherever you are. here's your extended outlook.

we invite you to download the nhk world app for free and ço#qñw us wherever you go.

genie: hello, everyone. this is "france 24." live time for 60 minutes around the world. these are the headlines. french prime minister manuel valls hands in his recognition that his resignation today to kick off his presidential campaign. he has been replaced by the former interior minister, renard cazenove. hate crimes -- bernard cassidy of. we will talk to a member of the anti-hate crime campaign