``We hope this contact he had with us will provide the kind of leadership we would expect from Japan,'' said Malaysian Foreign Minister Abdullah Badawi. ``We hope that they will play a more active role and they would be able to help us.''

``Although Japan is burdened with its own economic woes,'' Badawi, attending a South-East Asian Foreign Ministers' meeting in Manila, said Japan's role remains crucial in helping Asian economies recover from their financial crisis.

Tokyo is under increasing pressure from allies, prominently the United States, to sort out its economic problems as a first step toward creating a market for troubled Asian neighbors to sell their goods and containing the region's financial crisis.

``It has been a common expectation that Japan wouldput its economic house in more effective order so that it could revive its own economy and could be able to pull along other economies,'' said Thai Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan.