Japan diplomat committed suicide under threat from China: reports

Japan diplomat committed suicide under threat from China: reports

27 December 2005 Khaleej Times

TOKYO - A Japanese diplomat who committed suicide while based in Shanghai left suicide notes stating that Chinese intelligence was trying to blackmail him into leaking secret information, news reports said on Tuesday.

The suicide notes of the diplomat, whose name was withheld, spelt out how he was threatened by a Chinese agent over his relationship with a hostess at a karaoke club, the Weekly Bunshun magazine said.

The Japanese government acknowledged that the diplomat, a communications officer in his 40s who was in charge of encryption of classified communications with Tokyo, killed himself in May last year but declined to elaborate.

“If the incident as reported happened, we would have to take appropriate measures including filing a protest against the country involved,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe told a regular press conference.

In Beijing a Chinese foreign ministry official described the reports as “groundless”.

The Chinese intelligence agency wanted to know the contents of Tokyo-bound reports from the then Shanghai-based consul-general Nobuyuki Sugimoto, who was well-connected among local politicians and Communist party members, the Weekly Bunshun magazine said in a six-page report.

The agency also wanted information on Japanese encryption systems, the weekly said, citing various unnamed foreign ministry sources.

The top-selling Yomiuri Shimbun said the diplomat’s suicide notes revealed he had been pressed to leak information about which flights are used to carry classified documents from Shanghai to Japan and who worked at the consulate.

The Japanese foreign ministry’s internal investigation team has concluded that the consul killed himself under Chinese threat, the Bunshun said.

“If I were to do more, I would have to sell Japan. I cannot sell my own country,” one of the notes said, according to the Yomiuri and Bunshun.