Police are to question a 56-year-old Foreign Ministry official in connection with the latest fraud case to hit the ministry involving alleged padding of hotel bills.
The assistant director at the ministry's European Affairs Bureau is suspected of defrauding the government out of several million yen by having a Tokyo hotel overcharge the ministry's account and personally using the hotel with the padded funds, police sources said Tuesday.
The Chiyoda Ward hotel has been used as a venue for international conferences handled by the ministry. It allegedly pooled the overcharged money and allowed the assistant director to use the hotel free of charge.