Defense Minister Tomomi Inada said Friday she will cooperate with an internal probe into a suspected data coverup concerning troop activities during a U.N. peacekeeping mission in South Sudan, after reports emerged of her alleged role in the matter.
But while expressing a readiness to be questioned by inspectors, the minister denied playing a role in keeping from the public the daily activity logs that were initially said to have been discarded by Ground Self-Defense Force members but that had actually been preserved.
Inada also repeated her intention not to step down from her post, though many observers say her days as defense minister are numbered anyway as she is widely expected to be replaced in a planned Cabinet reshuffle early next month.
"We need to conduct a thorough investigation of facts linked to recent media reports. I want to cooperate as quickly as possible," Inada said at a press conference.
The logs, compiled by GSDF members who were serving as peacekeepers, described tense security situations last summer in the fledgling African country. The information, had it been disclosed in a timely fashion, could have affected parliamentary debate on the operations of the troops in the U.N. peacekeeping mission.
Inada insisted that she has "consistently" sought to make public the daily activity logs, which had been sought through an information disclosure request.
While acknowledging that she is being criticized for creating a mess for the Defense Ministry and the Self-Defense Forces, Inada indicated that she does not intend to resign, saying "I will properly do what I should do."
The issue dates back to December when the ministry turned down a request to disclose the logs recording the GSDF activities in July last year when the security situation in South Sudan sharply deteriorated, saying the documents had been discarded.
At the prompting of a ruling Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker, the ministry conducted a fresh search and in early February disclosed the information was found on the computer of the SDF Joint Staff Office, claiming that the GSDF had discarded the same data.
But the issue took another turn in March as media reported that the data had actually been preserved by the GSDF. Inada subsequently ordered her ministry's special inspection unit to probe the matter, but she herself came under fire due to her alleged involvement in the scandal.
