The Finance Ministry has made public protest letters it sent to The Asahi Shimbun newspaper over the daily's April 5 report that looked into relations between key figures of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan and senior ministry bureaucrats, saying the article has "many descriptions based on misinterpretation of facts."
In a rare move, the ministry said it has uploaded the letters onto its website because the country's leading national daily "failed to respond to its action convincingly."
The Asahi Shimbun story, which shed light on the relationship between the DPJ and the ministry around the time when the party came to power in September 2009, was carried on the front page of the April 5 morning edition.