The Japanese government decided early Wednesday to have Environment Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi serve concurrently as foreign minister, Kyodo News reported, quoting government sources.

Tanaka told reporters that Koizumi notified her of his decision at the prime minister's official residence after she was summoned there.

"I was told by the premier that he wants me to leave the outcome up to him, because he needs to pass the budget (through the Diet)," Tanaka told reporters.

"I ask whether he was dismissing me, and he said yes," she added.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda handed Tanaka a resignation document for her to sign but Tanaka refused to sign it immediately as the decision had been too sudden, according to Tanaka.

Nogami later told reporters that he was taking responsibility for causing confusion in the Diet by resigning.

Tanaka and Nogami had been making contradictory remarks in the Diet over whether senior Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Muneo Suzuki was involved in the decision to bar two NGOs from the international donor conference on Afghanistan last week.

During Monday's Budget Committee Session, Tanaka said that Nogami told her in a January 21 phone conversation that Suzuki did not want the two NGOs, Peace Winds Japan and Japan Platform, to participate in the international conference on reconstruction assistance to Afghanistan.

But Nogami immediately denied that at the same session, noting that he "remember this (conversation) clearly."

Suzuki has publicly denied pressuring the ministry to bar the organizations, suggesting Tanaka may not be telling the truth.

Koizumi apparently decided on the major personnel change as the conflicting remarks by Tanaka and Foreign Ministry bureaucrats caused the opposition party to boycott parliamentary proceedings Monday and Tuesday.

As a result, Japan's ruling coalition pushed through the second extraordinary budget for the current fiscal year at the lower house Budget Committee late Monday and the chamber's plenary session Tuesday night in the absence of opposition lawmakers.

Meanwhile, Suzuki indicated his intention to resign during a telephone conversation with Koizumi, according to LDP Secretary General Taku Yamasaki.

As to personnel appointments following the premier's decision to sack Tanaka and Nogami, Yamasaki denied to comment, saying that the ruling coalition will make the decision soon.

(Xinhua News Agency January 30, 2002)