Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Japan would extend the aid -- which includes a previous pledge of more than $30 million -- to affected countries and international organizations.

The promise pushed the world aid pledge to the disaster zone well over $1 billion.

It also put Asia's biggest and wealthiest economy at the top of the global donor effort to help countries recover from the disaster, which has killed more than 140,000 people from Malaysia to Somalia.

At least 23 Japanese died in the Dec. 26 disaster, the Foreign Ministry said Jan. 1.

The Japan Times Weekly: Jan. 8, 2005
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