Overview
- The Diet approved the National Intelligence Council Establishment Act on May 27, making the council a cabinet-level body chaired by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
- The existing Cabinet Intelligence and Research Office will be upgraded into a National Intelligence Bureau to serve as the council’s secretariat, and the government aims to launch the bureau in July.
- The new bureau will have statutory coordination powers to request information from other ministries, a provision that critics say increases the need for external checks on intelligence activity.
- Major opposition parties including the Constitutional Democratic Party, the Japanese Communist Party, and Reiwa Shinsengumi voted against the law and editorials and civil liberties groups warned it could enable privacy intrusions and monitoring of protests or civic activity.
- China’s Foreign Ministry publicly criticized the law by linking it to past Japanese militarism, and the government has signaled plans to speed work on a Spy Prevention Law and consideration of an external intelligence agency.