Former Cabinet Minister Fukushiro Nukaga agreed Monday to give unsworn testimony to a closed-door Diet ethics panel over money he received from the scandal-hit mutual-aid insurance group KSD, Liberal Democratic Party officials said.
Nukaga asked Seisuke Okuno, head of an ad hoc House of Representatives panel called the Deliberative Council on Political Ethics, to call a meeting in which he would answer questions "to prove he did nothing wrong," they said, adding the meeting would likely be held Feb. 26.
The opposition has demanded Nukaga testify under oath in the Diet, which carries the threat of perjury charges if false testimony is given. Perjury can be committed with impunity in council testimony.