Prosecutors said Friday they found e-mails shared between several officials who are under investigation as part of the probe into CNK International’s stock rigging scandal.

The prosecution said the officials, whose names were withheld, said in the e-mails that they “could not make up any more fake materials” to prepare a report overestimating the diamond reserve of a CNK mine in Cameroon at 420 million carrots.

The report was later used as a justification for the Foreign Ministry’s press release which announced that CNK won the rights to develop Cameroon’s prospective diamond mine in December 2010 and that its diamond reserve was 2.5 times the annual global diamond production at that time.

Suspects under investigation include Kim Eun-seok, former senior diplomat in charge of energy and resource diplomacy, CNK International CEO Oh Deok-gyun and Cho Joong-pyo, former minister for the Prime Minister’s Office.

Earlier in the day, a Seoul court rejected prosecutors’ request for an arrest warrant for Kim, who was under suspicion of making up an overblown press release in connection to the CNK’s diamond mining project.

He was dismissed from the post in January due to the scandal.

Judge Lee Chung-suk said: “Kim’s suspected collusion with accomplices in the stock manipulation has not been properly laid out, and he is not likely to destroy evidence or flee.”

By Kim Yoon-mi (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)