A Japanese politician who was seen sobbing over dubious spending in a video that went viral has offered his resignation.

Assemblyman Ryutaro Nonomura, 47, a Hyogo Prefectural assemblyman, will have to wait to find out if the assembly will accept his resignation, spokeswoman Chika Fukuyama said.

Mr Nonomura burst into tears and screamed nonsensical phrases when he was asked at a news conference last week about the number of trips he took to a hot springs at taxpayers' expense.

The video had drawn 2.7 million views as of Friday on just one site. His wailing spawned several spoofs, some of which juxtaposed his voice with rock music and jazz piano.

Calls for his resignation have grown after it emerged Mr Nonomura visited the hot springs 106 times last year, using public money, and reporting it as political activity.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.