at 20:00 (JST), March 09 (Autoscroll)

White House officials confirm US President Donald Trump accepts the idea of meeting with North Korea's leader by May.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says he has agreed with President Trump to hold a summit in the United States as early as next month.

エラー 2042

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/upld/medias/en/radio/news/20180309200000_english_1.mp3


Key words : Trump accepts
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_22/

White House officials confirm US President Donald Trump accepts the idea of meeting with North Korea's leader by May.

Trump is tweeting "great progress" is being made.

South Korean delegates made the initial announcement at the White House after they hand-delivered a letter from Kim Jong Un to Trump.

South Korean National Security Office chief Chung Eui-yong said, "I told President Trump that in our meeting North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said he's committed to denuclearization. He pledged that North Korea will refrain from any further nuclear or missile tests.
He understands that the routine joint military exercises between the Republic of Korea and the United States must continue."

Chung Eui-yong is the head of South Korea's National Security Office. He and his team briefed Trump about what they discussed with Kim in Pyongyang this week.

Trump tweeted that Kim talked about full denuclearization with the South Korean representatives and not just a freeze. He added that sanctions will remain in place until an agreement is reached.

If a Trump-Kim meeting goes ahead it would be the first between the leaders of the 2 countries. There are no details on exactly when or where it would happen.

Tensions over North Korea's nuclear and missile programs have recently fallen since the North's involvement in South Korea's recent Olympics.

Earlier Seoul said the North declared it would have no reason to possess nuclear weapons if the safety of its leadership can be guaranteed and military threats against it removed.

The North also reportedly said it won't conduct further nuclear or missile tests as long as communication channels are kept open.

Key words : relative abducted
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_20/

A relative of a Japanese woman abducted by North Korea says a US-Pyongyang summit would provide a great opportunity to resolve the abduction issue.

Shigeo Iizuka is the elder brother of Yaeko Taguchi. He heads a group of abductees' families.

Iizuka expressed hope that US President Donald Trump will take up the abduction issue during talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Iizuka said the US president showed understanding of the matter when they met last November.

Iizuka also called on the Japanese government to work to bring back the abductees as early as possible.

Key words : south welcome willingness
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_21/

The South Korean government has welcomed US President Donald Trump's willingness to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by May.

The vice spokesperson at the Unification Ministry, Lee Eugene, made the remark in a news conference on Friday morning.

Lee said South Korea hopes the recent developments will help to achieve the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and become a significant opportunity for securing peace.

Key words : delegate met visit
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_25/

A South Korean delegate who met North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Japan next Monday and Tuesday to give a briefing on the recent inter-Korean talks.

Japan's Foreign Ministry said on Friday that South Korea's National Intelligence Service chief, Suh Hoon, will meet Foreign Minister Taro Kono next Monday in Japan.

Kono will be briefed on the details of an agreement that North and South Korea reached earlier this week.

The ministry added that a meeting with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is also being arranged.

Key words : Abe agreed with telephone
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_17/

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says he has agreed with US President Donald Trump to hold a summit in the United States as early as next month.

Abe was speaking to reporters in Tokyo on Friday after he had a telephone conversation with Trump.

He said Japan will continue to put maximum pressure on North Korea until the country takes concrete action to abandon its nuclear and missile programs.

Abe added that he will work closely with Trump to resolve the issue of North Korea's nuclear and missile development, as well as the abductions of Japanese nationals.

The prime minister referred to the proposal by North Korea to hold talks with the US president on the premise of the North's denuclearization.

Abe said the change in North Korea's stance is the result of continued pressure from Japan, the US, South Korea and the international community.

Key words : government national tax questioned
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Key words : finance ministry died
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_30/

A finance ministry official who was involved in the sale of state-owned land to a school operator has died.

Allegations of document tampering over the land deal are now at the center of a Diet debate.

Investigative sources say the official from the ministry's local branch in western Japan was found hanging in his residence in Kobe City on Wednesday. He later died. Police say he left what appears to be a suicide note at his home.

The sources say he was a subordinate of another official who was in charge of direct negotiations with school operator Moritomo Gakuen. The school operator bought the government-owned land in Osaka Prefecture in 2016.
The local branch of the ministry says it cannot comment on personal information about its employees.

Key words : Insight paralympic
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Key words : volcano erupt half a day
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_29/

A volcano in southwestern Japan resumed erupting on Friday afternoon after it had stopped for half a day.

The Meteorological Agency says Mt. Shinmoe, which straddles Kagoshima and Miyazaki prefectures, erupted shortly before 4PM on Friday. Eruptions had stopped early in the morning.

Plumes of smoke reached 3,200 meters, the highest since the eruptions began on March 1st. Large pieces of rock sailed 800 meters from the crater.

Agency officials said there was a lava flow on the slope northwest of the crater.

They say people don't need to evacuate at this time because no homes or tourist facilities are on the slope and the lava is flowing slowly.

The agency is keeping the volcanic alert level at 3, on the scale of 1 to 5. This means people should stay away from the mountain.

Key words : survey survivor
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180309_01/

A survey of survivors of the March 11th, 2011, disaster reveals that most of those who evacuated early had already decided where to flee in the event of a tsunami.

Results of the survey were released ahead of the 7th anniversary of the disaster on Sunday.

It gained responses from 1,338 residents of the northeastern cities of Kesennuma and Rikuzentakata. Both cities were hit hard by the tsunami.

They include respondents who say they evacuated for fear of a tsunami right after the quake struck.

61 percent of such respondents in Kesennuma and 57 percent in Rikuzentakata say they had prepared evacuation plans in the event of a tsunami.

If respondents who said they had rough evacuation plans are included, the percentages rose to 84 in Kesennuma and 75 in Rikuzentakata.

The survey also reveals that people who fled at later stages, such as after seeing the tsunami, tended not to have formulated evacuation plans.

The survey was conducted by a team under Associate Professor Shosuke Sato at Tohoku University's International Research Institute of Disaster Science.

Sato says data in the survey firmly corroborates the assertion that deciding where to evacuate before disasters is important.