CHICAGO - Nissan is recalling 39,000 vehicles in the United States and Canada to fix a problem with the gear shift, the Japanese automaker said Friday.

"Due to interference between the shift rod and the shift knob, the vehicle may be shifted out of the park position without depressing the brake pedal," Nissan said in a letter to safety regulators.

"The operator can inadvertently shift the vehicle into gear without the brake pedal being depressed, increasing the risk of a crash or injury to a nearby pedestrian.

The recall affects some 36,600 2012 Nissan Versa vehicles in the United States and 2,400 in Canada.

Repairs will be performed at no expense to owners, who will be contacted shortly by Nissan.

BRUSSELS - A tiny revolutionary fold-up car designed in Spain's Basque country as the answer to urban stress and pollution was unveiled Tuesday before hitting European cities in 2013.

The "Hiriko", the Basque word for "urban", is an electric two-seater whose motor is located in the wheels and which folds up like a child's collapsible buggy, or stroller, for easy parking.

Dreamt up by Boston's MIT-Media lab, the concept was developed by a consortium of seven small Basque firms under the name Hiriko Driving Mobility, with a first prototype unveiled by European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso.

"European ideas usually are developed in the United States. This time an American idea is being made in Europe," consortium spokesman Gorka Espiau told AFP.

Its makers are in talks with a number of European cities to assemble the tiny cars that can run 120 kilometres (75 miles) without a recharge and whose speed is electronically set to respect city limits.

They envisage it as a city-owned vehicle, up for hire like the fleets of bicycles available in many European cities, or put up for sale privately at around 12,500 euros.

Several cities have shows interest, including Berlin, Barcelona, San Francisco and Hong Kong. Talks are underway with Paris, London, Boston, Dubai and Brussels.

The vehicle's wheels rotate 360 degrees, it's windscreen slides up like one one on an old airplane and it need 1.5 metres (yards) of parking space.

The project is described as a "European social innovation initiative offering a systematic solution to major societal challenges: urban transportation, pollution and job creation".

TOKYO - Japan's Toyota will stop exporting its Camry sedan to North America and fully shift to local production for the vehicle, regarded as one of its signature cars in the United States.

A Toyota spokesman confirmed the move on Monday as the automaker's latest Camry hybrid went on sale across Japan.

He refused to say if the long-anticipated move was an effort to grapple with the strengthening yen, which has seen Japan's biggest automakers shift more production overseas to maintain competitiveness.

"Production of the Camry was mainly carried out overseas anyway and Japan's exports were only meant to fill the gap between local production and local sales", a Toyota spokesman said on Monday.

Exports of the Camry from Japan have been steadily falling in recent years. In 2008 Toyota exported 8,200 Camry units from Japan to North America, but this fell to 3,200 in 2010, when global Camry sales exceeded 690,000.

The automaker has exported just 20 units since the beginning of this year.

The yen is hovering near a post-war high against the dollar, pushed up by safe haven demand as risk-averse investors seek a refuge from markets roiled by worries over the health of the US and European economies.

A strong domestic currency erodes the repatriated profits of Japan's exporters, prompting fears that more jobs will move overseas and contribute to a hollowing out of Japanese industry.

The nation's new finance minister Jun Azumi said Monday that the yen's recent strength is not economically justified, and makes life difficult for Japan's exporters.

He added that he will try to forge a consensus among the Group of Seven industrialised nations that "excessive yen rises" do not benefit the world economy, when finance officials meet in France later this week.

Azumi's predecessor Yoshihiko Noda oversaw three interventions to weaken the yen with little lasting impact during his time as finance minister. Noda was confirmed as Japan's sixth premier in five years on Friday.

Azumi also said he wants to cut Japan's corporate tax, which is currently around 40 percent, as previously proposed by Tokyo, and offer incentives for Japanese firms to keep operating in the country despite the yen's rise.