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DPJ report finds Nagata misled party executives over fake e-mail+(Japan Economic Newswire Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)TOKYO, March 31_(Kyodo) _ The Democratic Party of Japan on Friday released a report on the fake e-mail issue, saying lawmaker Hisayasu Nagata misled senior party members by exaggerating the reputation of the man who provided him the e-mail and by giving information contrary to fact. The main opposition party said, however, it has given up trying to track down who originally produced the e-mail which Nagata used to allege in a Diet panel on Feb. 16 that a shady money transfer was made to a senior ruling party legislator. The report said Nagata "exaggerated" the reputation of the provider of the fake e-mail, freelance journalist Takashi Nishizawa, by telling his superiors in the party that Nishizawa was a "trustworthy" man. Nagata also gave false information about bank accounts which he said were used in a money transfer from Takafumi Horie, accused of orchestrating a major accounting fraud at Internet company Livedoor Co., to the younger son of Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Tsutomu Takebe, the report said. The investigation team said Nishizawa admitted he relayed the e-mail message to Nagata when they questioned him, but they failed to determine who initially produced the fabricated message or who potentially passed it on to Nishizawa. The report concluded that it is impossible to conduct further investigations. Nagata made the allegations against the LDP's No. 2 leader in a House of Representatives Budget Committee session on Feb. 16, but he and DPJ President Seiji Maehara later admitted the allegations were unfounded. The investigation report was released on the same day that party leader Maehara and Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama expressed their intentions to step down from their posts to take responsibility for the party deputy's unsubstantiated accusation. Nagata, who had been suspended from the DPJ, also tendered his resignation as a parliamentarian Friday. |