Tokyo - Japanese real estate developer C's Create Co filed for bankruptcy Friday as the US mortgage and credit crisis plagued Japan's real estate sector.

The Tokyo-based firm said it had 11.44 billion yen (107.86 million dollars) in liabilities.

C's Create faced increased difficulties in procuring funds because of a global credit squeeze sparked by the US subprime mortgage crisis, the company said.

The failure of C's Create came after the largest bankruptcy in Japan's real estate sector this year. Urban Corp filed for court protection from its creditors in August with 
255.83 billion yen in debts.

Tokyo - It has not been so long since the world worried about Japan's financial sector.

After the speculation excesses of the late 1980s and early 1990s Japan's banks moaned under a tremendous burden of non-performing loans.

Even as late as 2003 they sought financial bailout packages from foreign banks, especially from the United States.

Now the situation has changed dramatically as the US financial market has been turned upside down.

Now it is the Japanese banks that are starting to buy out their American counterparts.

Japan's banks have returned with a vengeance internationally, launching a series of major investments in the US financial sector.

Tokyo - Tokyo stocks see-sawed between positive and negative territory in morning trading Friday as investors were concerned about congressional passage of the US government's bailout plan for the financial industry.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Stock Average lost 23.19 points, or 0.19 per cent, to trade at 11,983.34.

The broader Topix index of all first-section issues was almost unchanged at 1,154.81, up 0.86 points, or 0.07 per cent.

Brussels - European Union officials on Thursday congratulated the new government in Japan, saying that they looked forward to working with Tokyo on major issues such as global warming.

"I am looking forward to working with you in order to deepen and strengthen EU-Japan relations and to continue our excellent cooperation in the G8 and multilateral fora," the head of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, wrote to Prime Minister Taro Aso.

"I consider Japan to be an important strategic partner for the EU with whom we share many basic values and interests," he wrote.

The EU's foreign-affairs commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, sent a congratulatory note to Japan's new foreign minister, Hirofumi Nakasone.

Recently, a plan to construct a ‘space elevator’ has been made by a group of scientists and industrial firms, with the aim to drastically reduce the cost of getting into orbit. 

The whole project to construct an elevator would cost around $9bn, and the plans for the structure has been published by the Japan Space Elevator Association. 

If this project is completed successfully, then the cost of satellite communications systems would be lowered to a great extent and the orbital manufacture will also become more economically possible. 

Tokyo - Japan in August saw its first trade deficit since January as surging oil prices boosted imports and export growth slowed, the Finance Ministry said Thursday.

The nation's trade deficit ran 324 billion yen (3.06 billion dollars), the ministry said.

Excluding January, when exports tend to slow because of business holidays during New Year's celebrations, Japan last logged a trade deficit in November 1982.