TOKYO (Kyodo) -- A company in Toyota, Aichi Prefecture, has not paid wages to around 150 Vietnamese technical trainees for at least one month, with the amount exceeding tens of millions of yen, a labor union said Sunday.

The firm's president told Kyodo News earlier this month that it cannot pay the salaries due to lack of operating funds, but he expressed willingness to utilize the Japanese government's system for reimbursing unpaid wages after halting operations.

Phan Tien Hoang, head of the labor office at the Vietnamese Embassy in Tokyo, voiced concern over the situation, saying many of his country's citizens in Japan are in dire straits because they cannot receive their pay.