Japanese Foreign Office
| 外務省 Gaimu-shō |
|
Seal of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan
|
|
 Ministry of Foreign Affairs Building |
|
| Agency overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | January 6, 2001 |
| Jurisdiction |
 Japan
|
| Headquarters | 2-2-1 Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-8919, Japan 35°40′26.4″N 139°44′56.4″E / 35.674000°N 139.749000°E |
| Employees | 5757 |
| Ministers responsible |
|
| Parent agency | Government of Japan |
| Website | http://www.mofa.go.jp |
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (外務省 Gaimu-shō) is a cabinet level ministry of the Japanese government responsible for the country's foreign relations.
The ministry was established by the second term of the third article of the National Government Organization Act [1], and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Establishment Act. According to the law, its chief is a minister of the cabinet, and "its mission is to aim at improvement of the profits of Japan and Japanese nationals, while contributing to maintenance of peaceful and safe international society, and, through an active and eager measure, both to implement good international environment and to keep and develop harmonic foreign relationships."
Under the 1947 constitution, the cabinet exercises primary responsibility for the conduct of foreign affairs, subject to the overall supervision of the National Diet. The prime minister is required to make periodic reports on foreign relations to the Diet, whose upper and lower houses each have a foreign affairs committee. Each committee reports on its deliberations to plenary sessions of the chamber to which it belongs. Ad hoc committees are formed occasionally to consider special questions. Diet members have the right to raise pertinent policy questions—officially termed interpellations—to the minister of foreign affairs and the prime minister. Treaties with foreign countries require ratification by the Diet. As head of state, the Emperor performs the ceremonial function of receiving foreign envoys and attesting to foreign treaties ratified by the Diet.
As the chief executive and constitutionally the dominant figure in the political system, the prime minister has the final word in major foreign policy decisions. The minister of foreign affairs, a senior member of the cabinet, acts as the prime minister's chief adviser in matters of planning and implementation. The minister is assisted by two vice ministers: one in charge of administration, who was at the apex of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs structure as its senior career official, and the other in charge of political liaison with the Diet. Other key positions in the ministry include members of the ministry's Secretariat, which has divisions handling consular, emigration, communications, and cultural exchange functions, and the directors of the various regional and functional bureaus in the ministry.
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