Japan's core consumer prices gained 0.8 percent in March, the fastest pace in over two years, in fresh evidence of cost-push inflation accelerated by surging fuel and raw material costs due to the war in Ukraine and a sharp fall in the yen, government data showed Friday. With the sharpest rise in energy prices in over four decades, the core consumer price index excluding volatile fresh food items marked the seventh straight month of year-on-year increase and the largest growth since January 2020, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said. Higher crude oil and other fuel costs lifted the core CPI by 0.1 ... (full story)