The No. 2 official of the International Monetary Fund urged the Bank of Japan on Friday to continue doing exactly what it has been doing in an attempt to curtail the country's deflationary spiral.

Ann Krueger, first deputy managing director of the IMF, told a news conference in Tokyo that a short-term prescription for ending deflation is to adopt an easier monetary policy.

"The BOJ clearly has the objective to end deflationary pressures as soon as possible," Krueger said. "In this context, I welcomed their recent actions to further raise the policy target for deposits held at the central bank."