Japanese Finance Minister Jun Azumi said he supports U.S. nominee Jim Yong Kim’s bid to lead the World Bank.

Kim’s work on HIV/AIDS in the World Health Organization shows the 52-year-old physician has expertise on developing nation issues, Azumi said Sunday.

“He is a highly competent individual who spearheaded efforts and contributed to AIDS issues,” Azumi spoke to reporters Sunday in Tokyo after meeting Kim. “We judge he’s an appropriate candidate for the World Bank and support his bid.”

Before meeting Azumi, Kim also met with Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qishan in Shaoxing, China, as part of a global tour to solicit “priorities and ideas” for the bank’s future, according to a statement Saturday from the U.S. Treasury.

President Barack Obama proposed Dartmouth College President Kim, who would be the first Asian-American to head the body. The World Bank plans to pick its new president April 16 after interviewing the three candidates for the post the previous week, according to three officials at the lender’s board.

Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is scheduled to meet the 25-person board April 9, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the dates haven’t been made public. Former Colombian finance minister Jose Antonio Ocampo is to be interviewed on April 10, followed by Kim on April 11, the officials said.

Kim was head of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and also served as director of the World Health Organization’s HIV/AIDS department. In 1987, he co-founded Partners in Health, a nonprofit organization that has opened clinics in countries including Haiti and Peru. 

(Bloomberg)