Japan Concedes Imbalance Peril, Pleads for Time
Japan, fingered again as the No. 1 villain in the huge U.S. trade deficit and bracing for a counterattack by Congress, admitted today the imbalance is a threat and pleaded for more time to reduce it.
“We must make an all-out effort to dissolve the trade friction,” said a grim Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone.
“The enormous trade imbalance is not desirable even for Japan,” agreed Foreign Minister Shintaro Abe. “We are fully aware of the U.S. dissatisfaction.”
The collective shudder came a day after the U.S. Department of Commerce reported America’s trade deficit in 1985 hit a record $148.5 billion and the red ink with Japan rose to a record $49.7 billion --a third of the total and the largest single country deficit. (Story, Part 4, Page 1)
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