NAGASAKI: Japanese Prime Minister KISHIDA Fumio said late on Friday that he canceled his planned trip to central Asia following a warning of an increased risk of a huge earthquake hitting the country.
“I will stay in Japan for about a week as the Japan Meteorological Agency is calling for preparations for an earthquake” to ensure that the government responds thoroughly, Kishida told a news conference in the city of Nagasaki after attending a peace memorial ceremony marking the 79th anniversary of the US atomic bombing of the southwestern Japan city.
The agency’s warning “is not a notification that an earthquake will occur during a specific period, but public anxiety is great,” he said, adding, “I want to be as careful as possible as the chief executive for crisis management.”
The meteorological agency issued the warning Thursday night after a 7.1-magnitude earthquake occurred off the coast of Miyazaki Prefecture. It warned of a possible megaquake along the Nankai Trough off the country’s Pacific coast.
Kishida was scheduled to visit Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Mongolia from Friday through Monday. During the trip, the first summit between Japan and five Central Asian countries was set to take place in Kazakhstan.
After returning to Tokyo, he called Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev separately to report the decision to cancel the trip and say that he wanted to schedule another trip in the future. Both presidents expressed understanding for the cancellation, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry.
Kishida plans to speak by phone with the leaders of the four other countries, including Mongolia, soon.
JIJI Press