TOKYO, March 28 (AFP) - French President Jacques Chirac called Monday for a tax on airline fuel and tickets by the end of the year to fight epidemics in Africa in what could be a test for a more far-reaching tax on financial transactions.

Chirac made his proposal at the end of a three-day visit to Japan, which was marked by a dispute over his push to lift a European Union embargo on selling weapons to China.

"France and Germany together are calling for the creation by the end of the year, along with all countries that wish, for a first international solidarity tax on kerosene and airline tickets to fund the fight against AIDS and the great pandemics that are decimating Africa," Chirac said.

"More than three million lives saved each year: that's what is at stake," Chirac told a French-Japanese economic forum in Tokyo.

The French leader said he presented the idea during talks Sunday with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and wanted to take it forward at the July Group of Eight summit in Scotland and the September summit of the United Nations in New York.

"I hope strongly that we can accomplish these goals together in the upcoming G8 and United Nations summits," Chirac said.

The idea could serve as a test-bed for more far-reaching ideas to fund international development or the fight against HIV/AIDS.

In January, Chirac listed a number of options before the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, including a "contribution" on international financial transactions or a tax on capital movements in or out of countries with secretive banking practices.

The idea is supported by Germany, Spain, Brazil and Chile. But the United States is firmly opposed and Japan is sceptical, as is much of the international business community.

The proposals are variations of the so-called "Tobin Tax," named after American Nobel laureate James Tobin who came up with the idea in 1971, to tax capital flows as a way of reducing speculation on global markets.

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