Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori met with a series of foreign leaders who were visiting Japan to attend the official funeral of the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, organized by the Government of Japan and the Liberal Democratic Party (see following item). He conferred individually with President Bill Clinton of the United States, President Kim Dae Jung of the Republic of Korea, President Joseph Estrada of the Philippines, President Abdurrahman Wahid of Indonesia, and Prime Minister John Howard of Australia, and also met with leaders and cabinet members of states belonging to the South Pacific Forum.
In the meetings between the Prime Minister and Presidents Clinton and Kim, the leaders agreed that Japan, the United States, and the Republic of Korea would maintain close liaison regarding policy toward North Korea in the leadup to the summit between the leaders of the Republic of Korea and North Korea. The Prime Minister also engaged in active exchanges of views regarding the July Group of Eight Kyushu-Okinawa Summit in his meetings with foreign leaders.

The official funeral for the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, sponsored by the Government of Japan and the Liberal Democratic Party, was held in the Nippon Budokan, Tokyo. The approximately 6,000 mourners included Their Highnesses the Crown Prince and Princess and other members of the Imperial family, the Speaker of the House of Representatives and President of the House of Councillors of the National Diet, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and representatives of various sectors of Japanese society, as well as dignitaries from 153 countries, three regions, and 22 international organizations. Among them were President Bill Clinton of the United States, President Kim Dae Jung of the Republic of Korea, and other foreign leaders, as well as ambassadors to Tokyo. The late Prime Minister Obuchi, holder of the Second Senior Court Rank and the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum, died on May 14 at the age of 62, following a stroke.
Delivering the eulogy as the chief mourner, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori said in part, "No one was more concerned than he with the current conditions and the future of our nation as we approached the tumultuous turn of the century. His inner being was afire with an indomitable spirit and the desire to stand as a 'reformer.' It was he who staked his very life on steering this nation, caught in the vortex of tribulations, to safety. I am anguished to think how deeply disappointed Mr. Obuchi must have been to have had to retire from the arena of action, felled by an unforeseen illness. Still midway on the path to his goal, he departed without witnessing the fruits of his own labor."

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori met with leaders of the 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) at the Prime Minister's Official Residence. The ASEAN leaders had come to Japan to attend the official funeral of the late Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi on June 8 (see preceding item). The main theme of the meeting was "The Kyushu-Okinawa Summit and Asia's Voice." The Prime Minister said that he would propose extending assistance to developing countries for information technology at the Summit and also expressed the idea of setting up a fund for channeling assistance to new ASEAN members, such as Cambodia and Vietnam, and to the ASEAN Secretariat.
The ASEAN leaders said they wanted the Summit to discuss such issues as reform of the international financial system, the strength and latent power of the Asian economy, and an early start to the World Trade Organization round of multilateral trade talks. All in all, the meeting served as a valuable opportunity for the Prime Minister to hear Asia's voice directly.

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori met with President Jerry Rawlings of the Republic of Ghana at the Prime Minister's Official Residence. During the 30-miute meeting the Prime Minister said that Japan considered Ghana the [a?] locomotive of African stability and growth and that he hoped for still better relations between the two countries. Noting that debt relief for the poorest countries was on the agenda of the July Group of Eight Kyushu-Okinawa Summit, he praised the firm will with which Ghana was addressing structural economic reform despite its economic difficulties and pledged Japan's continued support for Ghana's socioeconomic development. (President Rawlings, who had arrived in Japan on June 11 to attend the June 13 International Symposium on Perspectives of the Twenty-first Century: A Search for Comprehensive Conflict Prevention, organized by the Japan Institute of International Affairs and the Japan Foundation, delivered the keynote address, "Conflict Prevention: Experiences in Africa.")

In view of the continued volcanic activity on the island of Miyakejima, part of Metropolitan Tokyo, a liaison office was established in the Crisis Management Center in the Prime Minister's Official Residence at 8:05 p.m. on June 26. The same day, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori put all relevant agencies on full alert. The next day he visited the Crisis Management Center, where he was briefed on the situation by Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary for Crisis Management Tadao Ando and encouraged the center staff.