Man who once had the ear of the countrys most powerful man. Ling jihua was a close aide of former president hu jintao. He is accused of a serious disciplinary violation. The staterun Xinhua News Agency said the communist party is investigating ling who currently serves as vice chairman of the chinese peoples political consultation Conference National committee. Ling had a long career with the communist youth league. The organization produced many senior politicians loyal to hu jintao. Hong kong media have reported that ling asked Zhou Yongkang then a member of the Standing Committee to help cover up a story. He wanted to hide news that his son had died after crashing a popular sports car. Zhou was expelled from the party earlier this month. President xi jinping has been waging a campaign that reached the upper echelons of chinese politics. The massive landslide in indonesia earlier this month has forced 2,000 people to live in temporary shelters. The National Disaster agency has ended its search for the missing after getting the consent of their families. Still, the heavy, intermittent rains are continuing. Racing fears of another mudslide. The mudslide hit a mountainous area of the banjarnegara district in central java on december 12th. The mud buried more than 100 homes. The agency says that 95 people died, 13 others remain missing. The agency pledged to support the survivors and said that relocating the evacuees will be a major challenge. It estimates that around half of indonesias 250 Million People live in areas prone to landslides. The landslides usually strike during the annual rainy season between november and march. Meteorologists in japan say 2014 is on track to be the hottest globally on record. And theyre warning of increasing cases of abnormal weather. Experts with Japans Meteorological Agency looked at the first 11 months of the year, and theyre estimating world temperatures were 0. 27 degrees celsius higher than usual. Thats the hottest since authorities began keeping records in 1891. Nhk world meteorologist jonathan oh offers his analysis. The agency stated in its report that the increase in Carbon Dioxide levels in the atmosphere along with the el nino pattern are contributing to the higher temperatures and Global Warming. This is drmed by taking whens considering the climate average temperature from the past 30 years and then comparing it to more than 120 years of temperature records to calculate the amount of temperature increase. The jma report shows the warming conditions are expected to continue. One of the most visible attributes meteorologists at the Agency Source is the higher frequency of Severe Weather conditions taking place throughout the world. In north america, persistent heat in the u. S. Desert southwest led to extended Drought Conditions with serious damage to crops. The dry conditions also contributed to the wildfires along the u. S. West coast. The average temperature for the continent was 2 degrees celsius higher based on records from january to november of this year. The heat was also an issue in europe. Record high temperatures were recorded in february, april, october and november. Meanwhile, typhoons in the western pacific were impressive. Typhoon vongfong was one of the strongest systems recorded in the region. Another typhoon named nuri eventually became one of the most intense extratropical cyclones of the North Pacific ocean, causing serious belowaverage temperatures in north america. In addition, four typhoons landed in japan, which is the highest total since 2004. Strong storms in south asia led to severe and persistent heavy rain and flooding. More than 1,000 people in india died between july and september due to the flooding and landslides, while more than 360 people perished in the pakistan floods. Jma official Koji Ishihara says more abnormal weather is expected to take place as the effects of Global Warming continue to unfold. Thousands of people are expected to pour into the grounds of the imperial palace in a few hours to help the emperor celebrate his birthday. Emperor akihito is turning 81 and held a News Conference ahead of the occasion. The emperor expressed praise for the three japanese born win of this years nobel prize in physic. He said the award was one of the most impressive event of the year. He says he feels proud of the three scholars and wants to express deep respect to them. The emperor was asked about his thoughts as japan prepares to mark 70 years since the end of world war ii. He said its the duty of the survivors to ensure that those who died didnt die in vain. The emperor, empress and other members of the imperial family are scheduled to appear on the veranda of the imperial palace on tuesday morning. A third party panel says a japanese newspaper asahi shimbu has been criticized for its past reporting. A panel of experts was set up to examine its reporting on those known as comfort women. The panels report was submitted to asahi president masataka watanabe. Translator i once again extend my sincere apologies for causing trouble over a series of asahi reports on those referred to as comfort women. In august, asahi retracted past articles based on accounts by yoshida. In those articles, yoshida testified hed taken korean women away against their will to serve japanese soldiers. A researcher published findings in 1992 that yoshidas testimony was very dubious but the paper continued to carry his accounts and articles. The panel pointed out that the asahi remained passive, failing to send reporters to confirm the findings. It says the asahi betrayed the trust of its readers and its actions should be criticized for violating journalistic ethics. The question also questioned asahis decision not to apologize to readers when retracting its reports. It said it was irresponsible toward its readers. Translator ill take what the panel says in the report seriously. I also promise to press ahead with reforms in a bid to fundamentally remake the company. Watanabe said he will hold a News Conference on friday to clarify his companys view on the report. Weve got a series featuring people who have a big influence on japans economy. This time, we talk with haruhiko kuroda, the governor of the bank of japan. In april last year, kuroda unleashed the boldest round of stimulus the country has seen. Its commonly referred to as quantitative and qualitative easing or qqe. He plans to drag japan out of deflation by changing the way Business Leaders and consumers act. He toeps to create a cycle of growth where rising prices of goods deliver more profits to firms that will hopefully lead to better wages, more spending, higher prices and ultimately revive the economy. Nhk senior commentator spoke with him about his policy and outlook for the economy. Reporter kuroda became governor at the bank in march last year. Previously, he was vice minister for International Affairs at japans finance ministry and governor of the Asian Development bank. We asked kuroda to give his take on the state of economy right now. The Third Quarter gdp figure was slight negative, negative growth. Why the Third Quarter gdp growth was negative, partly because of weak recovery of consumption, but mainly because of substantial decline of inventory investment. Meaning, ongoing inventory adjustment. That is, in some sense, good because after inventory adjustment is made, production would increase. And actually the recent Boj Tankan Survey showed fairly strong corporate sector business sentiment, as well as Business Plan for the current fiscal year. They would increase investment, and they expect continued good profit situation. And at the same time, the household sector experiences continued increase of employment and continued increase of normal wages. So i think most of Economic Indicators show that the japanese economy would recover because of underlying trend of recovery. Reporter higher wages are important to create a positive economic cycle, but now many people say prices are rising, but inflation is not much by wages. What do you think the policymakers can do to create an environment favorable to pay raises . If you exclude the direct impact of consumption tax hike, real wages are increasing, but, of course, consumption tax itself is a tax, and for the time being, if you include consumption tax impact, real income may not show a clear sign of positive increase. But from april next year, the direct impact of consumption tax hike on Consumer Price inflation would go away, and employment income would continue to increase so that even if you deflate by the inflation rate, real income, real wages would show clear positive sign from early next year. The yen keeps weakening against the dollar. Whats your assessment of the positive and negative effects of the weaker yen on the japanese economy . What about such effects in the scenario where the yen becomes even weaker . Depending on sectors or depending on the scale of Economic Activities and so on and so forth, the impact of yen depreciation may be diverse in the short run, but if a yen depreciation or whatever kind of Exchange Rate movement is based on economic fundamentals, basically i think it would not create any problem. From now on, how Exchange Rate behaves, its difficult to predict, and anyway, we do not target our Monetary Policy to Exchange Rate. We do not intend to inference the Exchange Rates to gain competitiveness and so on. No, thats not the case. And i can assure you that our Monetary Policy will continue to be targeted at achieving the 2 inflation rate. In october, policymakers at the central bank surprised everyone by expanding the scale of their monetary easing. They said they were worried the shift away from deflation was. Thats because weak spending had persisted after the increase in the consumption tax. And also, because Falling CrudeOil Prices Continue to weigh down prices. Crude Oil Prices Continue to slide. If this trend continues and there is a risk that the transmission function of the quantitative and qualitative easing is weakened, will the central bank make another adjustment . In the short run, oil prices will tend to exert downward pressure on Consumer Price inflation. That is true. But eventually, in the medium to long run, decreased oil prices would raise inflation rate, consumer inflation rates, toward 2 . So although when we decided to expand our qqe at the end of october, were concerned about weak recovery of consumption, weak recovery of production, and also, possibly negative impact on prices of continued Oil Price Decline. After that, inflation expectations, generally speaking, are maintained and the market responded very positively. So i do think that Oil Price Decline is basically beneficial to the japanese economy. Reporter in january last year, central bank and government officials put out a statement. The bankers said theyd focused on driving inflation. Government officials promised to do their best by putting japans finances in order. Prime minister shinzo abe threw that plan off course by postponing a second tax hike from 8 to 10 . The governments decision to postpone the consumption tax hike has in effect delayed the process of fiscal. If longterm Interest Rates rise because of deteriorating public finances, will that undercut your efforts . I think if, i mean, this is a big if, if Fiscal Consolidation is delayed substantially and the market concern over the sustainability of the public finance, then Interest Rates might be affected. That is a possibility. But at the same time, the government continues to stick to the medium term fiscal plan to achieve the primary by fiscal 2020, and also, the government declared that concrete measures to achieve the 2020 target would be fresh out by next summer. And i think that is a very clear commitment to fiscal sustainability, Fiscal Consolidation. So i do not expect any serious impact on the gdp prices, but i would like to emphasize that the government is to stick to the mediumterm fiscal plan and to achieve the primary surplus by fiscal 2020. In a metaphor about qqe you said the patient should continue to take medicine until the disease is completely cleared. Yes. Regardless of the medicine, side effects might occur. What do you think the side effects are for unconventional monetary easing . I dont think the problem would be only in the unconditional Monetary Policy. Even in the conventional Monetary Policy, if you prolong monetary easing too long, then you might experience some kind of of Financial Market excess or something. A bubble and soandso. Second, under the qqe, we have been carefully monitoring the Financial Market, the conditions. Whether theres any excess or not, and every six months the boj issue Financial Market report. And under the latest report, you can see that at this moment, theres no financial excess. So we will continue to carefully monitor our Financial Market, Financial Institutions carefully so that we should not jeopardize financial stability. Our objective, our target is 2 inflation. Consumer price increase. And were only halfway. So we are now mainly focusing on price stability and we continue qqe until 2 target is made and maintained in a stable manner. In the meantime, of course, will we continue carefully monitoring the financial system. Reporter haruhiko kuroda, thank you very much. Thank you. Every morning, investors turn their attention to asia. The tokyo market leads the way and markets around the world follow. From the decisions that could change the course of an economy. To the companies at the forefront of change. Up to the minute market reports. And analysis by specialists from around the world. Get all the latest Business News and insight every day here on newsline. At the end of this month, u. S. Led International Combat troops will end their mission in afghanistan which began after the 9 11 terrorist attacks in the u. S. Security duties in the country will then pass to the Afghan Military and police. But with the talibans hostilities on the increase, there is growing concern that the situation may get worse. Nhk worlds masaka suda reports. Reporter in the Southern Province of helmand, fighting between Government Troops and the taliban have been intensifying. Since the pullout of International Forces began in spring this year, Government Forces have faced an uphill battle. Many of the new recruits are from Farming Families and joined up to escape poverty. They were sent into battle with minimal training. Soldiers injured in combat were being brought into a Military Hospital one after another. Translator a bomb exploded when we were on patrol. Translator were removing the that rap knell from the soldiers bodies. Reporter taliban insurgents are regaining power. They are expanding control by winning the support of local people who are frustrated with the slow pace of National Reconstruction. The militants funds come from trafficking opium made from poppies. We spoke to taliban members active in the north. The taliban once had little influence there, but its strength is now growing. Many of the members say they joined only recently. One is a former member of security forces. Translator this is my police i. D. Reporter this man was a Police Officer until about six months ago. The talibans combat strength convinced him to join the insurgents for his own safety. Translator the taliban was very strong, but the government didnt provide us with suitable weapons to fight them. Reporter the talibans advances are also affecting global aid for afghan reconstruction. In the Central Province of gol, japanese aid has financed the building of schools, roads and other infrastructure. But the local security situation worsened after International Troops withdrew last year. The building of a clinic was suspended after the Construction Firm in charge of it fled. Translator security was good whether the u. S. Led troops were here. I miss the time when the clinic was being built. Reporter afghanistan is still far from the selfreliant and stable country that people were hoping for. It still has a long way to go before it can achieve the National Reconstruction that global aid donors want to see. Masaki suda, nhk world, kabul. Here is the threeday weather forecast. Thats all we have this hour on newsline. Im ross mihara in tokyo. Thank you for watching, and have a good day. Here is your host. Welcome to euromaxx highlights. We have put together the best reports of the week. Lets have a look at our top three. How photographer Martin Schoeller gets amazing shots of celebrities. Natural beauty why sicily is considered one of italys most beautiful destinations and, mapping the body area why Antony Gormley is one of the most soughtafter sculptors in the world. It is said that many a star is actually afraid of awardwinning portrait photographer Martin Schoeller, because he tends to bring out a side the public rarely gets to see. He has photographed many celebrities and made a name for himself with his wacky shots. His most successful series is close up and now he is back