welcome to "newsline" business. the japanese economy shrank 0.9% in the january to march quarter reflecting the broad economic impact of the march 11th natural disaster. cabinet office figures show japan's gdp fell for a second straight quarter. the 0.9% fall translates to an analyzed 3.7% shrinkage. private consumption fell 0.6% as the damage from the quake limited the supply of goods. another factor was that some consumers held back from spending money in the aftermath of the disaster. business investment was down 0.9%, falling for the first time in six quarters. meanwhile, exports rose 0.7%. with the quake's impact on the economy, what can we expect from the coming quarters? we asked the chief economist at barclays capital japan. >> translator: the gdp analyzed. so gdp proved worse than we had expected. that said, we think that real gdp will start to grow in the quarter between july to september, after recording another decline in the quarter, between april to june. and we think the recovery will be driven by two

>>> hello and welcome to "newsline." it's 11:00 a.m. in tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. >>> kim jong-il and his heir apparent is visiting china, a key ally of the country. south korea government sources say he crossed the border aboard a train on friday morning and arrived in northeastern china. the sources say that the brother-in-law of kim jong-il is likely to be accompanying the heir apparent. last september kim jong un was named the vice chairman of the ruling korean workers party, indicating that he was officially chosen as the successor to his father. observers had been expecting kim jong un's first solo visit to china. >>> tepco will release its earnings report today. ai uchida from the business desk gives us the details. >> hi there, welcome to "newsline business." tokyo electric power company, or tepco, is expected to post an historic loss of around $15 billion in the fiscal year ended march. this is due to the huge cost of recovery efforts arising from the recent disaster. a source close to tepco says the company will allocate $5 billio

welcome to "newsline" business. sony corporation has confirmed yet another leak of personal data, bringing the total number of accounts affected to over 100 million. sony says that personal information of 24.6 million people was hacked from a computer system of sony online entertainment as of monday. the u.s. subsidiary develops and distributes online computer games. the figure includes data of 185,000 users based in japan. sony earlier confirmed that personal information of 77 million online customers of its playstation and music and movie distribution services had also been compromised. >>> honda motor has shifted production of a new model to an assembly plant in central japan due to expected power shortages this summer in the greater tokyo area. honda started production of the new model at a plant in suzuka city on monday. it used to made in the tokyo area in a plant that was run by tepco. they may have to reduce electricity supplies this summer. honda's move is aimed at stable production of the new model. howeve

>>> hello, welcome to nhk world "newsline." it's now tuesday may 3rd. a national holiday here in japan. the united states has accomplished a mission of killing the mastermind of the 9/11 terror attacks osama bin laden. >> the united states has conducted an operation that killed osama bin laden, the leader of al qaeda. and finally, last week, i determined that we had enough intelligence to take action and authorize an operation to get osama bin laden and bring him to justice. today, at my direreioio the united states launched a targeted operation against that compound in abbottabad, pakistan. no americans were armed. they took care to avoid civilian casualties. after a fire fight, they killed osama bin laden and took custody of his body. we will never tolerateur security being threated, n stand idly by when our people have been killed. >> the operation was carried out in abbottabad, 50 kilometers north of islamabad. the biding in which osama bin laden was hiding is located in a wealthy residential area and surrounded by five meter high walls. the u.s. di

>>> welcome to "newsline." i'm michio kijima in tokyo with the news at this hour. >>> a top south korean official says north korean leader kim jong il could be visiting china instead of his heir apparent as initially reported. the official retracted earlier remarks that a north korean train that arrived in northeastern china was carrying the north korean leader's son, kim jong un. he explained that intelligence reports indicated that the train was most likely carrying kim jong il himself. sources familiar with the china/north korean relations said the delegations left two men at a province and stopped at a lake where a monument honors the late founder of north korea, kim il song. an employee at a hotel told nhk that a north korean leader had arrived and that people were banned from entering nearby hotels and restaurants. kim jong il is expected to visit cities in northeastern china. >>> the leaders of japan, china, and south korea are meeting this weekend in tokyo. this get-together will be the fourth in a seri

here is your extended forecast now. >>> and that wraps up this edition of "newsline." do stay with us. /s ge 0çc@

>>> hello there, welcome to "newsline." it's tuesday may 31st, 9:00 a.m. in tokyo. the operator of the troubled fukushima nuclear power plant reported high levels of radioactive water. tepco says a water sample can taned 2 million becquerels of radioactive cesium per cubic meter. >> translator: water affected by the damage is leaking from the pressure vessel and containment vessel. >> tepco created a map that shows the distribution of the contaminated water in the plant buildings. it will use this to prevent a recurrence of the accident in march. at that time, three workers were exposed to radiation by stepping in tainted water. the company plans to set up a cooling system to circulate decontaminated water back into the reactors. this is expected to be installed in july. tepco will install equipment to purify contaminated sea water near the water intakes near the number 2 and 3 reactors. they use a mineral to absorb the radioactive cesium. preliminary operations will begin as early as thursday. the utility previously built undersea silt barriers to prevent highly ra

. >>> hello, and welcome to nhk "newsline." a team of workers am enter the number one reactor building at the fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant on thursday for the first time since march 11. the first step in a plan to safely cool down the reactor. the workers will set up a purifier. this is being done ahead of work to restore the cooling functions in the reactor. earlier, tepco disclosed plans to restore the cooling system by circulating water in the reactors' containment vessel. however, the company faces many challenges before the work to set up the system can begin. they include whether the purifier will be able to filter the air to a level that will allow workers to remain inside for extended periods. even if workers manage to enter, radiation levels may remain high near where a water circulating system is to be installed. the workers may need to clean the pipes with water and contain radiation with lead sheets. they may also have to change some damaged pipes and valves. also to circulate water inside the containment v

that wraps up this edition of "newsline." stay with us.

>>> glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." >>> 11:00 a.m. in tokyo. >>> tokyo electric power company says highly radioactive water has been leaking into the se southeast at the fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant but it's been plugged. they found the contaminated water flowing from a pipe into a pit near the number three reactor on wednesday morning. the workers filmed near want intake pipe and found toxic water leaking from the wall of the pit into the ocean. tepco says the water contained 37,000 becquerels of cesium 134 per cubic centimeters or 600,000 times over government limits. they found seawater between the intake and nearby special barrier was 32,000 times above limits for cesium 134. the barrier was supposed to prevent radioactive water from spilling into the sea. the firm managed to stop the leak later in the day after it blocked the pipe and buried the pit in concrete. last month tepco confirmed that radioactive water leaked into the ocean from a cracked pit outside the number two reactor. that leak, too, was stopped. the crisi

. >>> welcome back to "newsline business." japanese consumers have cut back on spending. how long will this trend continue? our market reporter spoke with the chief market economist on his outlook for personal consumption. >> ever since the march 11th disaster, personal consumption has remained very weak. in fact, household spending showed a record drop in march. what is your analysis of people's spending behavior? >> yes, of course, we had very bad numbers, especially in the consumption area. in march we saw household spending was down 8.5%. we saw minus 51% plans of nuclear. after the earthquake struck, japanese consumption was pushed down strongly. however, i think there was i'd say a sporadic direct point on the need of obtaining water or bread or milk. when we see convenience store sales in march, then it was up 7.7%. in supermarket sales we see plus 0.3%. so generally the sentiment of consumers are very bad after the earthquake struck. however, to get food, water, or small batteries or even toilet paper, in some areas the data shows some positive numbers in consumpt

>>> glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." it's tuesday, may 31st, 8:00 a.m. in tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. the operator of the damaged fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant reported high levels of radioactive water that accumulated in the basement of the number one reactor. tokyo electric power company or tepco says a water sample contained 2 million becquerels of radioactive cesium per cubic centimeter. >> translator: we speculate that water affected by the reactor damage is leaking from the pressure vessel and from the containment vessel. >> tepco created a map that shows the distribution of the contaminated water in the plant buildings. it will use this to prevent a recurrence of accident in march. at that time, flthree workers we exposed to radiation by stepping in tainted water. company plans to set up a cooling system to circulate decontaminated water back into reactors. the system is expected to be installed in july. tepco says it will also install equipment to purify contaminated sea water near the water intakes at the number two and three reactors. the pur

>>> hello there, glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." it's tuesday, may 10th, 8:00 a.m. in tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. >>> elevated radiation levels are again hampering the work to bring the troubled fukushima daiichi nuclear power plant under control. tokyo electric power company says it may need to slow down work at the number 1 reactor raising concerns that the overall plans to repair the plant will be reviewed. the company measured radiation levels at several spots in the reactor building on monday as part of its preparation to fill the containment vessel with water and restore a circulating cooling system. the company's concerned that the reactor's pipes are leaking radioactive water contaminating the area. the test yielded a maximum of 700 millisieverts per hour which would only allow workers to stay in the vicinity for around 20 minutes. however, employees spent half an hour doing the tests and were exposed to as much as 10.56 millisieverts of radiation. tepco says the figures are higher than acceptable for worker safety. >> translator: we hope that radiation

and that's all for this edition of "newsline." thanks for joining us. 2 247. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com

that's all we have this hour on "newsline." i'm ross mihara in tokyo. thanks for staying with us on nhk world.

>>> glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." it's tuesday may 17th, 8:00 a.m. in tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. the operator of the fukushima daiichi nuclear plant will announce on tuesday a revised plan tcool down the reactors one month after original one. tokyo power electric company says it needs to pour water into the reactors. it had confirmed earlier that the fuel rods had melted and may have burned holes in the number one reactor pressure vessel. radioactive water is likely flowing from the containment vessel into the basement. tepco says it suspects a similar situation is happening in the number two and three reactors. the firm says it's considering pumping water out of the containment vessels and circulating it back into the reactors after cooling it with heat exchangers. it's also thinking of taking water from the basement of the reactor buildings and putting it back into the reactors after removing the radioactive substances. tepco is expected to keep to its original schedule of stabilizing the reactors within six to nine months. >>> the japanese government w

>>> glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." it's wednesday may 11th, 11:00 a.m. in tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. >>> two months have passed since the great east japan earthquake and tsunami. the disaster has left more than 24,800 people dead or missing. people are making efforts, oath rather police are making efforts to recover bodies and continue their search for people unaccounted for. the national police agency puts the number of deaths at 14,949. by prefecture, 8,941 have been confirmed dead in miyagi. 4,400 in iwate and 1,544 in fukushima. the number of people who remain unaccounted for has fallen to 9,880 from a peak of 17,600 in late march. some people were counted twice. while others became evacuees. in fukushima prefecture where the troubled nuclear power plant is located, the number of missing has fallen to 600 after briefly approaching 6,000 in confusion during evacuation. meanwhile, japan's weather officials say the number of aftershocks is declining gradually. but the officials warn of a possibility of strong aftershocks, especially in eastern japan. during

glad to have you on edition of "newsline." tuesday, may 2thth, 8:00 a.m. i tokyo. i'm catherine kobayashi. the operator of the fukushima plant will install two heat exchangers on the number two reactor building on tuesday to lower the temperature of the spent fuel pool. last wednesday, tokyo electric power company workers entered the building to check radiation levels. but the high humidity prevented them from staying longer than 14 minutes. the humidity is thought to stem from the high temperature of the spenfuel pool and steam from the suppression pool, which may have been damaged by the explosions after the march 11th earthquake and stsunami. tepco plans to reduce the humidity by instalng the heat exchangers in the building next to the reactor. the exchangers will take in the hot water from the pool and circulate it back after it's cooled. the utility says it hopes to start using them this month to reduce the temperature of the pool from around 80 degrees celsius to about 40 degrees celsius within a month. tepco hopes to install the exchangers at the number one

>>> glad to have you on this edition of "newsline." it's wednesday, may 25th. 9:00 a.m. in tokyo. i amam'catherine kobayashi. >>> the operator of the fukushima daiichi talk in clear power plant says the disaster knocked out the disaster's cooling system creating holes in the pressure vessel and damaging the containment vessel opinion on tuesday, tokyo electric power company released the results of its analysis of the temperature and water level of the reactor. the temperature of the containment vessel began to rise immediately after the earthquake. it shot up 15 hours after the quake when a meltdown is believed to have occurred. at 9:00 a.m. on march 12th around 18 hours after the quake, the vessel's temperature had reached 300 degrees celsius. that's more than double the temperature it was designed to withstand. >> translator: when the temperature of a containment vessel hits 300 degrees, the rubber and metal parts used to seal joints will be damaged. highly contaminated water may have leaked threw these damaged sections. >> this is the first time that tepco has given details of

>>> "welcome to "newsline." i'm michio kijima in tokyo with the news at this hour. >>> an official from japan's nuclear safety agency said a fuel melt down at fukushima daiichi number one reactor will have an impact on how the crisis is controlled. nishiyama says filling the reactor's containment vessel with water may not be worth it. nishiyama says the melted rods at the bottom of number one reactor is being cooled by a slow amount of water. he doubts it is necessary to flood the containment vessel entirely, something the tokyo electric power company has been trying to do. >> translator: it may not be necessary to flood the containment vessel entirely, even though there is not much water inside the reactor, the fuel rods are cooling down. >> tepco officials said thursday most of the fuel rods in reactor number one are believed to have melted and sunk to the bottom of its pressure vessel. they said the melted fuel has apparently cooled even though much of the water they've injected is leaking through holes at th

. >>> that's it for us now on "newsline." we'll be back with more news in half an hour. thank you for watching. thank you for watching. bye-bye. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com

that's all for this edition of "newsline." i'm catherine kobayashi in tokyo. do stay with us. my colleague james is up next with the top news the next hour with more updates. see you then.

. >>> that wraps it up for now on "newsline." we'll be back with more news in half an hour.ou for watching. bye-bye.

another newsline a small group of briefly allowed back inside the radiation exclusion zone around the damaged nuclear plant for the first time the government go for mission for a short visit so the people could gather belongings and check up on their properties now on tuesday the company operating the facility tepco turned to the japanese government to help pay tens of billions of dollars in compensation to the evacuees. so u.s. and chinese officials have been putting on a show of smiles despite the suspicions that lurk not far behind them they've been meeting to try and fix the crux of a shaky relationship with consensus won't come cheap christine from experience. they say you should keep your friends close. and your enemies closer and as far as where china fits perceptions continue to evolve at this year's us china strategic economic dialogue in attempts by officials from both the u.s. and china at friendship the purpose to open communication on concerns like the debt ceiling in the u.s. and the rate of currency appreciation in china and joint concerns about the environment we both