Scandal snub

Tokyo - Japan's most powerful politician, Shin Kanemaru, who resigned last month after admitting to receiving pounds 2m from a transport company, refused to submit to questioning by the Public Prosecutor's Office, writes Terry McCarthy.

Investigators have asked Mr Kanemaru twice to come for an interview. But in an extraordinary display of the contempt for the legal system he let it be known that he will not answer the prosecutor's questions about the Sagawa affair, and is only prepared to submit a written account of how he received the money.