The former trade ministry bureaucrat who took on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's administration on one of the country's most popular TV news programs called out Japan's pliant media executives on Thursday for increasingly giving in to government pressure.

Speaking at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan in Tokyo, Shigeaki Koga noted a growing sense of fear among reporters at large media organizations. Last month, Koga staged a surprise show of protest during a live broadcast of the news program "Hodo Station," criticizing the alleged deterioration of press freedoms under the Abe administration.

Koga cited a recent summons from the information and telecommunications strategy panel of Abe's Liberal Democratic Party to officials from NHK and TV Asahi, demanding they attend a meeting on Friday to answer questions about two separate scandals in which the broadcasters have been ensnared.