Visiting British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto on Monday pledged to work together to overcome the current financial crisis in Asia, Kyodo news agency reported.

"Hashimoto raised the current economic turmoil in Asian economies and expressed Japan's wish to cope with the problem in cooperation with Britain," the agency said, quoting Japanese Foreign Ministry officials.

The officials said that Blair, after being briefed on the results of a telephone conversation between Hashimoto and Indonesia's President Suharto, told Hashimoto Britain was ready to cooperate with Japan in resolving the problems.

Hashimoto called on Suharto to lead his country in keeping to an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on a bailout plan and in promoting domestic economic structural reform.

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.
 

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