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Bank
of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda also warned that there are
"various challenges" that G7 economies need to address as the
global economy suffers from subdued growth.
"With uncertainty over the global economy on the rise, attention
will be paid to macro-economic policy, structural reform and
measures to deal with tax evasion ... and money laundering," Aso
told reporters.
"As chair country, I'd like to steer frank discussions on these
issues," he said after arriving in the northeastern city of
Sendai for the two-day Group of Seven (G7) finance leaders'
meeting kicking off on Friday.
The meeting will pave the ground for a G7 leaders' summit next
week, where measures to boost global growth will be high on the
agenda.
Aso and Kuroda may struggle to mask a rift emerging among the
once close-knit group of G7 finance leaders on issues ranging
from currencies to fiscal policies.
Japan has lobbied for a G7 agreement to take coordinated fiscal
action to spur growth, but has received a cool response from
Germany, which insists on fiscal discipline.
Tokyo and Washington are also at logger-heads on whether recent
yen gains are "excessive", with both sides reluctant to have
their currencies rise too much and hurt their economies' fragile
recovery.
But the G7 nations may share their concern on weak global
growth, which may give Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe an
excuse to delay an unpopular sales tax hike scheduled for next
April.
Aso sidestepped a question on whether Japan will delay the tax
hike, repeating that there was no change to the government's
plan to raise the tax unless a massive earthquake or a crisis of
the scale of the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 hit Japan.
(Reporting by Tetsushi Kajimoto and Stanley White, writing by
Leika Kihara; Editing by Chris Gallagher and Kim Coghill)
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