TOKYO, Jan 30: Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi late on Tuesday fired his controversial Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka ending a a series of disputes involving her that had threatened to sidetrack his goal of economic reform.

Koizumi took action just minutes after the Lower House of parliament passed an extra spending programme designed to get the economy moving, a bill that had been temporarily derailed by the latest furore surrounding Tanaka and her senior foreign ministry bureaucrats.

For good measure, Koizumi also sacked a senior foreign ministry official, Vice Foreign Minister Yoshiji Nogami, and asked a senior lawmaker involved in the latest dispute about Afghan aid to step down from an influential parliamentary post.

Tanaka and the two had been fighting over who said what in a dispute over attendees at recent talks in Tokyo on rebuilding Afghanistan.

Tanaka alleged that influential ruling party politician Muneo Suzuki tried to bar certain non-governmental organisations (NGOs) from attending the conference, allegedly because they had made statements critical of the Japanese government.

PENCHANT FOR FEUDS: The outspoken Tanaka’s penchant for feuds had been seen distracting Koizumi as he battled to get Japan out of a worsening economic recession and break the stranglehold of conservatives within his own ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

In the latest sign of Japan’s economic woes, data released on Tuesday showed that unemployment rose to a record high 5.6 percent in December as recession and tough competition forced companies to shed more workers.

The budget had itself been held up for a day because of an opposition boycott over the Afghanistan dispute with the key opposition parties asking for an explanation to differing statements on what had happened.

Suzuki, long reputed to have clout with the foreign ministry, has clashed with Tanaka ever since she took office.—Reuters