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Hashimoto likely to run for LDP presidency

TOKYO: Japan's Trade Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, a rising star after helping to resolve a car trade dispute with Washington, is expected to declare for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leadership on Monday, a party spokesman said.

"Mr Hashimoto will hold a news conference at our party headquarters next Monday during which he is expected to declare his intention to run for the party presidency," the spokesman said on Friday.

LDP presidential elections are set for September 22. The party, the largest in Japan's parliament, is the senior partner in Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama's ruling coalition.

Foreign Minister Yohei Kono, whose two-year term as LDP president expires at the end of September, was expected to seek a second term.

Asked when Kono, 58, would officially declare his candidacy, the party spokesman said he would follow suit soon.

Hashimoto, also 58, is one of Japan's most popular politicians after he successfully averted U.S. trade sanctions over car trade last June. In opinion polls, he routinely figures as a favourite future prime minister.

Both Hashimoto and Kono retained their ministerial posts although Murayama changed 16 of his 20 ministers in a cabinet reshuffle earlier this month. -Reuter