Bomb threats made against Tokyo offices, hotels.

TOKYO, Sept. 18 Kyodo

(EDS: ADDING INFO IN 5TH-9TH PARAS)

Bomb threats were made Tuesday afternoon against several office buildings housing U.S. commercial banks as well as major hotels in central Tokyo, but the Metropolitan Police Department later said it believes they were pranks.

The threat calls were received between 2 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. According to the investigators, people who did not sound like native Japanese speakers said there would be explosions within 25 minutes. However, none were reported even after the time had elapsed, leading the police to believe the calls were pranks.

The buildings against which the threats were made in Tokyo and the neighboring city of Kawasaki in Kanagawa Prefecture house U.S. and other foreign financial institutions, investigators said.

Among them were the Akasaka Park Building in Tokyo's Minato Ward and the Hotel New Otani in Chiyoda Ward. Several hundred people in the 30-floor Akasaka Park Building, where Chase Manhattan Bank and Citibank have offices, were temporarily evacuated, security personnel there said.

''We heard an announcement that a bomb has been planted,'' said Shigeru Saito, 72, who was working out at a fitness club on the 23rd floor in the building when the order came to evacuate.

''The terrorist attack in New York just crossed my mind,'' said Saito, who evacuated the building wearing a T-shirt and shorts.

In Marunouchi, the prime business district in Tokyo, everyone at the Tokyo Ginko Kyokai Building was evacuated after another Citibank office, a tenant in the building, received a bomb threat call.

The building also houses some offices of the Japanese Bankers Association, which represents commercial banks in Japan. The threat call came about 30 minutes into a regular press conference being given by Yoshiro Yamamoto, the association's chairman.

In Kawasaki's Saiwai Ward, some 5,000 workers at Solid Square building, which also houses another Citibank office, evacuated just past 2:30 p.m.

The Hotel New Otani did not tell its guests to evacuate, according to a hotel official.

The Kojimachi police station in Chiyoda Ward, meanwhile, received a phone call saying the caller was going to blow up Itochu Corp., Hotel Okura and Hotel New Otani.

Itochu, an Osaka-based major trading house, also has a head office in Tokyo's Minato Ward, while Hotel Okura is a luxury hotel that is also in Minato Ward.

Reports of the threats apparently weighed on Tokyo stocks just before the market closed at 3 p.m., trimming huge early gains, market observers said.

The benchmark Nikkei Stock Average closed the day up 175.47 points, or 1.85%, at 9,679.88 after touching the day's high of 9,945.80 in the afternoon.