TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan may already have fallen into recession, the country's economics minister, Seiji Maehara, said on Monday.
"I cannot deny the possibility that Japan has fallen into a recession phase," Maehara told reporters, adding that a final assessment on the state of the economy would be made when more data became available.
He also said he expected theBank of Japan to pursue powerful easing, and that the government and central bank would work together to beat deflation and encourage economic recovery.
Japan's economy shrank 0.9 percent in the three months to September, marking the first contraction in three quarters, adding to signs thatslowing global growth and tensions with China are nudging the world's third-largest economy into recession.
The fall in GDP, which matched a median market forecast, translated into an annualised 3.5 percent fall, government data showed onMonday
