Japan Airlines Corp. President Toshiyuki Shinmachi has expressed his intention to stay in his post until March 2007, rebuffing a recent request to step down to take responsibility for the airline group's poor business performance, a major JAL shareholder said Friday.
"My responsibility is to put the rehabilitation plan on track," Eitaro Itoyama, JAL's largest individual shareholder, quoted Shinmachi as saying during their meeting Thursday.
Itoyama, a former Diet member, wrote on his Web site that Shinmachi said he will continue to head the country's top air carrier until the end of March 2007.