Japan Diet speaker suspected of bribing local officials in 2021 election

House of Representatives Speaker Hiroyuki Hosoda's camp paid several thousand yen per day in cash to local assembly members and others in western Japan during campaigning for last October's lower house election, documents showed Wednesday, in a suspected case of bribery in violation of the election law.Hosoda, who won a seat in the Oct. 31 lower house election last year in Shimane Prefecture's No. 1 district, recorded the payments as labor expenses, according to campaign expense reports. Labor expenses are usually paid for simple tasks.The cash was paid to current and former local assembly …READ FULL ARTICLE