According to a report in the Nihon Keizai Shimbun on October 24, the Japanese government will mandate that starting in April 2007 every mobile phone sold in Japan must be equipped with GPS technology, in order to enable the police and other authorities to better locate emergency calls made from handsets. Furthermore, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, which will be responsible for relevant legislation, will demand that handsets use a unified technology. Between 1999 and 2003, police say average response times increased by 1.5 minutes due the fact that mobile phones calls can not be traced to a location.