Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa offered an apology Tuesday at the Diet for errors he made in fiscal and monetary policies before and after the bubble economy of the late 1980s.
"Looking back on policies during that period of time, there are many regrettable points. I am truly sorry for this," Miyazawa said during a House of Councilors plenary session.
His remarks were in response to strong criticism from Shoji Motooka of the Democratic Party of Japan, who called Miyazawa a "class-A criminal" for creating the economic bubble and then letting it burst, bringing on the nation's current economic woes.