The Abe administration is looking into creating an overseas intelligence agency possibly modeled on Britain's MI6 spy service, ruling party lawmakers say, 70 years after Allied victors dismantled Japan's fearsome military intelligence apparatus following World War II.
A new foreign intelligence agency would be an integral part of a security framework Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is building as he seeks to loosen the pacifist Constitution's limits on the Self-Defense Forces' ability to operate overseas.
The idea that the nation's fragmented intelligence community needs a makeover has also gained momentum since the killing of two Japanese captives by Islamic State militants in Syria earlier this year showed how much the government relies on friendly countries for information.