Japan is strictly monitoring the currency market to eliminate any speculative moves benefiting from political uncertainty in Europe, Finance Minister Jun Azumi said Monday, indicating possible interventions to stem yen's sharp rise.

"I think there is a possibility that the results of elections ( in France and Greece) have amounted to some destabilizing factors pushing stock prices lower and leading the yen higher," local media cited Azumi as saying.

"We believe we must sufficiently monitor (the foreign exchange market) for any sign of speculative moves" which might be seen as taking advantage of such political disarray, he said.