The Foreign Ministry will increase the number of inspection officials in the wake of a scandal in which a former diplomat was indicted on suspicion of defrauding the government out of public funds, a senior ministry official said.
Foreign Minister Yohei Kono made the proposal, aimed at reinforcing internal accounting checks at overseas establishments, at a Thursday meeting with Senior Vice Foreign Minister Seishiro Eto and three parliamentary foreign secretaries, who backed the plan.
Kono proposed increasing the number of directors general for inspecting the ministry from the current one to between three and five as well as assigning private citizens or former bureaucrats as chief inspectors, who are dispatched overseas, the official said.