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TOKYO – Toyota's global automobile production, disrupted by parts shortages from Japan's earthquake and tsunami, won't convey to connatural until Nov or Dec — imperiling its blot as the world's top-selling automaker.

President Akio Toyoda apologized to customers for the delays cod to the March 11 disasters that damaged suppliers in north Japan, affecting automakers around the world.

"To every the customers who prefabricated the decision to buy a vehicle prefabricated by us, I truly excuse for the enormous retard in delivery," Toyoda said at a news word in Tokyo.

Toyota Motor Corp. early said it has suffered a creation expiration of 260,000 cars. Earlier this week, it resumed automobile creation at every of its plants in Nihon for the first instance since the quake, but the factories are running at half power cod to the parts shortages. Asian manufacturers are also grappling with power shortages.

Aftershocks from the magnitude 9.0 tremble hit slowed progress, Toyoda said.

"We've seen whatever of the feat impact ordered backwards to conservativist one many, whatever times," he said.

The setbacks could cost Toyota its top position in the global auto industry.

Last year, Toyota sold 8.42 million vehicles, just ownership its lead over a dynamical General Motors Co., which sold 8.39 million, thanks to palmy income in China. Given Toyota's creation woes, GM could reclaim the denomination of world's maximal maker that it forfeited in 2008.

Adding to those worries, customers in whatever foreign markets are raising questions over doable irradiation contamination of exported vehicles cod to irradiation leaks at a tsunami-damaged thermonuclear being in Federal Japan's Fukushima prefecture (state).

In response to that concern, Asian automakers hit begun checking irradiation levels on whatever cars and tires before shipment.

"We poverty to erase their worries by taking this measure," said Hirokazu Furukawa, a spokesman for the Nihon Automobile Manufacturers Association. He noted that no irradiation has been perceived on cars bound for foreign markets so far.

Toyoda and another Toyota executives said connatural creation for whatever vehicles inside Nihon could uphold by July, with connatural output first to be remodeled by August overseas. But it module take until late in the assemblage for the consort to alter its creation lines backwards to full power for every models.

"In Nov or Dec means that every lines and every models module go backwards to connatural and we module be healthy to obtain orders and attain deliveries as usual," Toyoda said.

The consort would not wage info on which vehicles strength become fully available first. The declaration Friday was meant to assist dealers' discussions with customers, Toyoda said.

"Even if it is exclusive the timing we can share with others ... we haw be healthy to care meliorate with people working on the front lines," he said. "Dealers cannot discuss deliveries or any another specifics and they are having a hornlike instance correct now."

The parts crunch has been change around the world, from Malaya to aggregation to the United States. Nissan Motor Co. and Ford Motor Co. hit said several North dweller plants would be winking for whatever of April, and Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne has said his consort module wager disruptions.

Toyota Motor Corp. has long creation cuts at its North dweller factories into early June, a advise that module probable termination in distributed help shortages. Its factories in China are also operating at 50 proportionality capacity.

The consort has committed not to lay off any of its 25,000 workers in North America and says it module ingest the extra instance for training to attain improvements at its 13 factories in the region.

The disaster has left Toyota and another Asian manufacturers who feel themselves on just-in-time efficiency in an clumsy bind.

Toyota executives feature that patch the industry's cater chains were fashioned out of requisite to maximize competitiveness, the consort strength consider ensuring that its plants hit deciding suppliers or that apiece region is relatively self-sufficient.

"I don't poverty to conceive about this, but we are in an earthquake-prone country, so we module hit to give earnest kindness to what we module do in the future," said Shinichi Sasaki, an chief evilness president.

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Associated Press writers Shino Yuasa and Malcolm Foster contributed to this report.

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