Former president could face 13 charges. And more protests ahead. People in hong can kong are bracining after the top candida wins the job. Developing story out of japan. Seven students and one teacher are feared dead after a ski resort north of tokyo. Dozens have been injured. Police and firefighters are trying to figure out what happened when the avalanche struck in nasu. A doctor has to examine the eight people before a death notice can be issued. About 60 students and teachers were taking part in the workshop. An avalanche advisory was in place at the time. It remains in effect. On the same day, another avalanche occurred on another mountain in fukushima prefecture. A 70yearold man was found unconscious. Another man in his 60s was found swept away. He was found unhurt. South korean prosecutors have requested an arrest warrant for former President Park geunhye. This is the latest development that has gripped the country in scandal for months and saw park booted from office. They want her arrested over fears she could destroy evidence and given that others have been arrested it would be unfair not to arrest her. She was question bid prosecutors last week and could face 13 charges. They say she accepted 13 billion from Corporate Giant samsung. She is expected of leaking classified information to her longtime friend choi soonsil at the center of the scandal. She is also suspected of extortion of two foundations run by choi. Another accusation is abuse of power, allegedly ordering a close aide and then culture minister to draw up a list of those deemed unfriendly to her. A court will consider whether to issue the warrant for park on thursday morning. The decision could come as early as that night. Hong kongs next leader has a tough road ahead. Carrie lam was elected by a large majority. She is a polarizing figure without a mandate from the public. Nhk worlds estella mok reports. Reporter her first step after her victory was to visit her former boss, the outgoing executive. He has become increasing unpopular since the protests three years ago. My priorities as laid down in the manifesto and the first task of trying to unify a society and to improve the relationship between the executive and the legislatur legislature. Reporter thats not an easy task. Opposition supporters remain skeptical about lams ability. The election under the culture of china government. Reporter the way the election was held has fueled resentment and frustration. Ordinary people werent allowed to vote. Lam was chosen by an Election Committee that has just 1,200 members and is dominated by probeijing delegates. Public opinion polls show lam is an unpopular choice. Her rival, john tsang, enjoyed much higher levels of support from regular citizens. A beijing plant tabled four years ago included a proposal for one person, one vote. But effectively excluded prodemocracy candidates from running. Students stood against that. Carrie lam represented the government during the demonstrations. She held talks with protest leaders but made no confessions. The proposed reforms were dropped but the irony is that people are stuck with the old framework. Carrie lam may have won beijings trust but has made herself an enemy of the prodemocracy camp. Lams main rival supporters say even though they lost this contest they have mainstream opinion behind them. What do you think of beijings intervention . I think beijing government should trust hong kong people. We are not against them. We can do something and let the peoples voice be heard by the other people so that we can make a difference. Reporter lam has called on her opponents to set aside their differences. Informing my governance team, my principle is to attract talents widely and on merits. Reporter but many remain skeptical. Experts say lam needs public support to n negotiate with beijing. To stand up and protect hong kong. But a side note its extremely difficult. Its extremely difficult for any chief executive to do that and for her it would be even more difficult because in one sense, we know that from the experience of the election. Reporter r hong kongng r resis are growing wary about beijings influence. Theyey expect president xi jinpg to make his First Official visit in july to mark the 20th anniversary of the handover from britain. Lam will take office the same day. People are worried about further confrontation as the new political chapter opens for the city. Estella mak, nhk world, hong kong. Thank you very much, estella. Turning to business, benchmark index fell below a significant threshold, putting a damper on overall market sentiments. Gene otani has that and other business headlines. For the First Time Since early february, investors were unsettled by the news last week that u. S. Republicans pulled their bill to repeal obamacare. That was one of president trumps key campaign pledges. Our Business Reporter phoebe amarosa has more from the tokyo exchang exchange. Such as plans for fiscal stimulus. The nikkei fell 1. 4 , closing at 18,985. Last time it closed below 19,000 was february 9th. The broader topix declined 1. 2 . On to currency levels, the dollar has fallen to its lowest level since november last year. The cautious mood is adding to the popularity of the safe haven yen. That stronger yen dragged down exporters, including automakers mazda and honda and tdk. The financials led the decline. These included brokerages such as daiwa securities, daiichi Life Holdings and major banks such as mitsubishi ufj. We may have seen the end of the trump rally, some say, and some traders pull back from optimistic bets. Im phoebe amoroso, reporting from the tokyo stock exchange. Uncertainties over u. S. Policy weighed on sentiment across the markets. Weighing on the index in sydney. Over in china, shanghai ended down by a fraction, 3,266 the closing number, after hitting a fourmonth high on friday, some property shares were sold after the central bank tightened housing loan rules. The rules also dragged down stocks in Hong Kong Hangseng index, down to 24,193, snapping two days of gains. Financials also ended lower. Japans largrgestever budg has cleared the upper house of diet. The government will spend an estimated 97 million tren or 880 billion starting in april. It provides more support for young people, including students and those raising children. It allocates spending to reform work efforts. 290 billion to meet the rising cost of an aging population. They tried to limit the rise in welfare spending. Seniors will have to pay more of their medical care coststs. Defenense spending hit a record 46 billion with plans to boost missile defense. On the revenue side, new bond issues will decrease from the current fiscal year to about 310 billion. That still accounts for more than onethird of total revenue. A court in tokyo has declared a Budget Travel agency bankrupt. Tell me club sold discount overseas tours on the internet. Angry custotomers flood the company with calls, complaining they couldnt get their flight tickets. Compmpany president apologigize a news conference. Tokyo District Court declared the start of bankruptcy procedures based on tell me club stating it was running out of cash. 36,000 transacactions worthth million are affected. It will consider using a security bond system of travel agents to refund customers. The latest document from central bank shows policymakers expressed mixed opinions when they met earlier this month. They decided at the meeting to keep their easing measures unchanged. That includes targeting the yield of tenyear government bonds at around zero percent. Some Market Participants believe the central bank needs to change Monetary Policy in response to rise by longtime yields overseas but many said the boj should patiently continue with the current policy framework and keep an eye on prices. Meanwhile a few officials said upward pressure on longterm yields is expected to strengthen and need to start discussing procedures to control the yields. Some big changes are in store for the board room of the company that operates the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Tokyo electric Power Company is planning on moving ahead with business reforms. The government owns a majority of shares in tepco giving it effective control. The Company Faces a decades long task of decommissiononing e meltdown reactors and payinin compensatition. Sources say goverernment officis aree now putting the finishihin touchess on a play to replace chairman fumio sudo. Taking his place will be takashi kawamura. President naomi hirose will become vice chairman and will focus on efforts to revitalize fukushima prefecture. Tomoakaki kobayakawa will bee taking over his job. They plan to hold a Board Meeting as early as friday to approve the new lineup. Lets check your Global Economic calendar for this week. Toshiba has called an extraordinary Shareholders Meeting for thursday. Executives will be seeking approval for spinning off their flash memory business. On the same day, u. S. Officials release the final reading of gdp growth for the october through december quarter and friday brings a wrath of Economic Data for consumers to review. Consumer price index and industrial output figures for february will be released and china, the Managers Index is out. We ask specialists each week to share whats ahead. We hear this week from the economist at credit suisisse securities japan. Bank of japan has spent years trying to raise prices. Its lost a massive easing program to spur inflation. Just 0. 1 . They expect limited recovery to continue. We expect the february. The reason is energy prices, negative contributor this year in february. Other items such as food, inflation or other durable goods inflation will remain weak. After the february, we expect fiscally the moderate increase inflationary rates. But any recovery should be limited and while our expectation for the 2017 inflation rate is 0. 6 , which is far below compared with bojs 1. 5. Boj policymakers have set an inflation target of 2 , likely to achieve this but shiono is skeptical. I think its difficult forecasting this in two years. More domestic cause of inflation like wage p pressure or momore recovery in the consumptions is necessary to achieve 2 . Shiono sees the boj Holding Steady for the time being but may adjust its policy on government bonds down the road depending on the performance of the u. S. Economy. For the moment boj will remain status quo. In case the fed continues to raise their Interest Rate and strengthen in such case boj could taper somewhat as their buying allows and it will naturally raise target rates of tenyear yield to, for example, 20 basis. Yes, it is possible this is very dependent on the performance in u. S. Economy. You can catch our report online together with a full crypt. Look for nhk world and business wrap. Thats it for business. Ill leave you with the markets. Japan has provided two training aircraft to help the country boost its patrol capability. The aircraft were delivered monday part of the deal reached by the two countries last year to lease five of the planes. Their range is double the Philippines Military aircraft. The Company Plans to maximize their capability in patroling surrounding waters. Translator as we face many securityrelated issues, including that of the South China Sea our cooperation with the philippines on Regional Security and stability is eveve now more significant. One of the issues is increased chinese activity there. Japan hopes it can also boostst the philippines capapabilities through the lease a and trainin of pilots. The planes are the first to be leased abroad by japan. Nuclear states are boycotting a conference to negotiate a legally binding treaty to Ban Nuclear Weapons, set to begin at the u. N. Headquarters on monday. U. N. General assembly voted to start negotiationsns. More than 50 nonnnnuclear countries submitted the proposal and 115 states supported the resolution. The treaty is to Ban Nuclear Weapons on the basis that they are in breach of international laws. More than 100 countries are expected to take part in the negotiations. U. S. And russia say negotiations lack the reality of international security. Japan is the only country to have experienced atomic bombings, but opposes the treaty. Japan is under the u. S. Nuclear umbrella and the governments position is that disarmament should occur in stages with both nuclearr and nonnuclear states. Japan is sending an envoy to speak at the conference but is unlikely to take part in the negotiations. Former u. S. Barack obama pushed for Nuclear Reform his successor, donald trump, has indicated he wants to boost u. S. Nuclear power. The Swedish Foreign minister told nhk last week that the negotiations are timely. In these days when you see more rhetoric but also threats to use Nuclear Weapons we have to break the deadlock that has been for so many years. Kisenosato is the first to win in more than 20 years. Winning the grand sumo tournament, he says, was unforgettable. [ speaking Foreign Language ] kisenosata faced champion fuji on the playoff bout. On the final day. Kisenosato had previously injured his shoulder but that didnt slow him down. [ speaking Foreign Language ] fans have been celebrating. Translator it was fabulous. Everyone in japan was deeply moved translator i cried. He did a really good job. The next sumo tournament will be held in may. We have an update on the race to become south koreas next president. Leading candidate has won a primary of the countrys largest political party, which is currently in the opposition. Its the first of several votes the party will hold to choose a president ial candidate. Moonjae is the former Democratic Party leader. He gained 60 of votes. Moon ran unsuccessfully in the lastst president ial election, telling Party Members he has been preparing for his second attempt for the countrys top post. The party should know who will lead it in early april. The election is scheduled for may 9th. The date was moved forward because of the impeachment of the former president. As we told you in our top story, eight people are feared dead in an avalanche in Tochigi Prefecture, north of tokyo. Jonathan oh tells us from the weather desk what conditions could have led to the tragic incident. Jonathan . Temperatures were hovering a little over freezing in Tochigi Prefecture, leading to melting of any snow in the area. Then colder temperatures came in sunday into monday, and that hehelped to refrfreeze any type melted snow. When you have t that kind of lar in place and you have additional snowfall, significant amount of snowfall, that creates that unstable layer that leads to the avalanche concern. Were looking at the satellite perspective. Low pressure system that was responsible for bringing a cold rain in tokyo brought a lot of snowfall. About 30, 40 centimeters of snowfall in 24 hours in Tochigi Prefecture. That really helped to create the instability as we went throughout the day on monday. Weve had a bit of when it comes to the amount of snowfall in the region in nasu over the past month. Look at this particular chart. It will tell you on average we should still have a decent amount of snow depth in place. But because of the lack of snowfall we really dropped off. But as we went throughout the day on monday, we saw that huge spike of snowfall. Like i mentioned, when you have enough of an icetype layer because of the melting that took place and then a ton of extra snowfall, youre just asking for trouble when that loose, weak layer gives way. Itss a very unfortunate circumstance thihis took place. This is a danger, especially during the latter parts of what was winterer. Now were into the spring months. And more snowfall may be into the picture as we go later on into the evening hours. We go into tuesday, things should be improving when it comes to precipitation, but avalanche advisories are still posted for areas in Tochigi Prefecture as we go forward in time. Definitely need to be very careful on the slopes as we go forward. Look at snowfall in kumamoto but everywhere else looking at dry and warming conditions. Rain may be in the picture in sapporo for thursday. In australia, a very different situation yet a very serious situation when it comes to a severe tropical cyclone. Debbie is very close to mackay and townsville. Currently packing winds of 155, gusts up to 220, we may be dealing with this system becoming a category 4 storm by the time it gets over into land. Maybybe even dealing with windsp to 240 kilometers per hour. This is something very serious. Forr those of you all along the centric coast of queensland you need to be gettingng out of the way of the system. This will be bringing a lot of rainfall not only over the potentially 250 millimeters of rainfall, thats flooding concern. Were looking at that possibility to last not just tuesday but wednesday and thursday, townsville to ayr, to mackay. Be on the lookout for this very powerful storm that will be in play as we go through this week. As you wrap things up, i want to take a look whats happening with this pressure system in the deep south that. Will bring strong thunderstorms, maybe even tornado concerns as well. Strong winds as we go throughout the day on monday. Hope you have a safe day wherever you are. Here is your extended outlook. We invite you to qea genie this is france 24. Thanks for joining us. Time for 60 minutes life around the world. Im genie godula. These are the headlines. Russias biggest Opposition Leader find for taking part in massive anticorruption protests sunday. Hundreds more were detained along with him. Details coming up. Syria thatll to get closer to the Islamic State onoups