Renault, Nissan in board meetings before expected new Ghosn indictment

By Laurence Frost, Naomi Tajitsu and Mike Spector

PARIS/TOKYO (Reuters) - Renault directors were due to be updated on the investigation into suspected financial misconduct by alliance boss Carlos Ghosn on Thursday, sources familiar with the matter said, as Nissan's board met to discuss ways to bolster governance.

The meetings, first reported by French newspaper Le Figaro, come a day before Japanese prosecutors are expected to indict the Renault boss and former Nissan chairman on more charges.

A Renault spokesman did not return calls and messages seeking comment.

Both boards would be updated on the situation, people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Nissan's board said in a statement after a discussion on the latest developments surrounding Ghosn that it remained committed to its alliance with Renault and Mitsubishi Motors Corp .

The board also said it had decided on a new interim process to determine compensation for directors and executives, and had agreed to widen the scope of company decisions that will be reviewed by the board, as part of a drive to improve governance.

Ghosn and senior Nissan director Greg Kelly have been charged in Japan with failing to disclose $43 million in additional compensation for 2010-15 that Ghosn had arranged to be paid later.

Both men deny the deferred compensation agreements were illegal or required disclosure.

Ghosn, who remains in detention, is likely to be formally charged with aggravated breach of trust for temporarily transferring personal investment losses to Nissan in 2008, and for understating his compensation for three more years through 2018, a person with knowledge of the matter said earlier.

A member of Ghosn's Japan-based legal team earlier told Reuters that Ghosn, 64, did not attend an interrogation session scheduled for Thursday due to a fever, and that he had been advised by a detention center physician to rest.

Carole Ghosn, the ousted Nissan chairman's wife, released a statement on Thursday pleading with Japanese authorities for more information about her husband's health.

"I recently learned that my husband is suffering from a high fever at the detention center in Tokyo, but my information is limited to news reports as no one in his family has been allowed to contact him since November 19," she said, adding that Japanese authorities have not provided Ghosn's relatives with details about his treatment or condition, nor allowed them to speak to medical personnel at the detention center.

"We are fearful and very worried his recovery will be complicated while he continues to endure such harsh conditions and unfair treatment," she added.

Ghosn said he was "wrongly accused and unfairly detained based on meritless and unsubstantiated accusations" during a court proceeding earlier this week, the car executive's first public appearance since his November arrest.

Whereas Nissan ousted Ghosn as chairman within days of his arrest, Renault has so far kept him as chairman and CEO, deepening tensions within their 20-year-old carmaking alliance.

(Reporting by Laurence Frost and Naomi Tajitsu; Additional repoorting by Gilles Guillaume; Editing by Edmund Blair, Mark Potter and Jonathan Oatis)