Watchdog: US ambassador Kennedy used private email

A report states Caroline Kennedy, U.S. Ambassador to Japan, used a private email for official business. Some e-mails contained sensitive information.

According to a report by the Office of Inspector General of the State Department, a recent inspection on the work of the Tokyo embassy found that private email accounts were used to send and receive messages for official business purposes.

However, the report noted that, in a departure from State Department practice, Kennedy’s chief of staff attended meetings as a note taker but that there were “gaps” in the record of what was discussed.

Kennedy is the daughter of late President John F. Kennedy.

“In addition”, the document states, “the OIG identified instances where emails labeled Sensitive but Unclassified were sent from, or received by, personal email accounts”.

The revelations come amid heightened scrutiny over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a personal email address connected to a personal email server while serving as the nation’s top diplomat.

In recent months, the State Department released thousands of Clinton’s emails from her private server to the Congressional Committee on Benghazi for their investigation into the role she played before and after the 2012 attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three US government employees. Kennedy is only said to be dealing in Sensitive but Unclassified material. However, it puts further spotlight on the department’s struggle to keep its information secure.

But State Department spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday that there was “absolutely no indication” that she had violated the department’s rules. The review is ongoing.

“Department policy is that employees generally should not use private email accounts (for example, Gmail, AOL, Yahoo, and so forth) for official business”.

However, Kennedy’s “high visibility” has “strained a number of programs at the embassy”.

The report says the ambassador is very popular in Japan because of her family history and has an “innovative” approach to public diplomacy. He said Kennedy and other staff were implementing in full the recommendations made in Tuesday’s report.