Tokyo - Record heavy rain that brought floods and landslides in central and eastern Japan overnight killed at least one person, injured another and forced thousands to evacuate their homes, media reports said Friday.

Suzue Kuroyanagi, 76, was found dead in her home in central Okazaki city, which was flooded in the heavy rain that engulfed houses overnight in central and eastern Japan.

An 80-year-old woman was missing in central Aichi province Friday. Her home was flooded by a nearby river and the foundation caved in.

A newspaper delivery man in his 60s remains in a critical condition at a hospital in Aichi after he fell into an irrigation ditch along with his bicycle.

Tokyo - Japan's economic indicators on Friday showed the fastest rise of the nation's consumer price index (CPI) in more than 16 years, a slowing down of household spending, a slightly better unemployment rate and stronger industrial output data for July.

Japan's core consumer price index (CPI) grew 2.4 per cent in July from a year before, marking the 10th straight monthly rise, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said Friday.

Tokyo - Stocks rose more than 2 per cent Friday as the Tokyo market sentiment improved thanks to overnight gains on Wall Street and Japan's July industrial output data.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Stock Average jumped 279.37 points, or 2.19 per cent, to 13,047.62.

The broader Topix index of all first-section issues was also up 27.96 points, or 2.29 per cent, to 1,247.49.

Japanese industrial production in July grew 0.9 per cent in seasonally adjusted terms, compared to the previous month, the government said Friday.

Berlin - Japanese electronics group Sharp forecast Thursday that annual world demand for LCD flat-panel televisions would burst through the 100-million barrier some time this year.

At a news conference on the eve of the IFA consumer-electronics fair in Berlin, Sharp also boasted its thinnest flat-panel yet, with the thinnest part of the device just 22 millimetres from front to back, or less than on inch. The thickest part was just two inches.

Tokyo - Japan's financial sector has been plagued by a series of bankruptcies of real-estate firms, giving rise to worries about Japan's economic outlook and having an impact Thursday on the stock

Tokyo - Japan's leading carmaker Toyota Motor Corp expects sales in 2009 to drop, owing to weak demand from North America, the company said Thursday.

Toyota lowered its global sales prognosis from 10.4 million units to 9.7 million units for next year, delaying the company's goal to become the world's first carmaker to sell more than 10 million units per year.