Any effort to add rules against currency cheating in a 12-nation Pacific trade pact would mean the end of negotiations, a senior Japanese negotiator said. Some U.S. lawmakers are pushing for a currency chapter in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which is near completion, partly due to concerns about a weak Japanese yen. But Japan's deputy chief trade negotiator, Hiroshi Oe, told reporters there were no discussions about currency manipulation, and if the issue was brought to the table it would mean the end of negotiations. The U.S. administration and other TPP partners have also warned against introducing currency into the deal. "We simply don't think that's the forum in which you would have currency manipulation rules," Simon Newnham, minister-counsellor for trade at the Australian embassy in Washington, said at a Wilson Center event. (Reuters)