Japanese government officials on Wednesday urged Toyota Motor Corp. to regain the US consumers' confidence, ahead of a key US congressional hearing to be attended by the company's president Akio Toyoda.

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama told reporters later in the day that he believed Toyota will be able to "recover consumers' confidence if it responds in a sincere manner."

He also said that proper handling of the Toyota safety issue will prevent the matter from developing into a major economic dispute between Japan and the United States.

"Toyota should take seriously the fact that it had quality defects and manage to restore the trust of the people in the United States," said Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano, the top government spokesperson, at a news conference.

Hirano declined to comment on speculation that reaction to the safety issue in the United States may be partly politically motivated.

Meanwhile, Japan's Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Masayuki Naoshima also urged Toyota to respond at the upcoming hearing "with a frank and sincere stance so as to reassure anxious US consumers and to recover their confidence."