The first and foremost is that responding to the changes in the international financial markets has become a very important issue to the future of the Japanese economy, as evident from the financial crises involving the emerging economies since Thailand in the summer of 1997.
The other reason is because we feel that the international activities of the Bank of Japan is not well understood, relative to the contributions the Bank has made so far. In the next hour or so, I would begin with some salient features of recent international financial crises and the roles of central banks therein.