Tokyo: Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told a Saudi-organised economic forum to "shut your mouths" but she wasn't being rude; it was a line from a well-known manga comic.

"I understand that Japanese manga and anime are extremely popular in Saudi Arabia. Titles like 'Captain Tsubasa', 'One Piece', and 'Demon Slayer' come to mind," Takaichi told the event on Monday.

"But today, I'd like to borrow a famous line from 'Attack on Titan' to conclude my speech. 'Just shut your mouths. And invest everything in me!!'," she said.

Takaichi was speaking at the FII PRIORITY Asia 2025 conference, a spinoff of the annual Future Investment Initiative (FII) in Saudi Arabia that is dubbed "Davos in the Desert".

Takaichi, who took office in October, is under pressure to attract investment to boost the world's fourth-largest economy, which contracted in the third quarter.

The two-day conference in Tokyo also included SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son, who said he wept about the receent sale of the firm's shares in US chip titan Nvidia, Bloomberg News reported.

"I don't want to sell a single share. I just had more need for money to invest in OpenAI" and other projects, Son said. "I was crying to sell Nvidia shares."

AFP