A vice culture minister offered to resign Tuesday over suspicions of document forgery, the culture ministry said.

The resignation, if accepted, comes only six months after Park Jong-gil, the vice minister in charge of sports at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, assumed the post in March.

The move came after local media raised suspicions that he forged a public document in the process of handing over the ownership of a shooting range in Seoul's western residential area to his wife.

"I'm really sorry for troubling the people with my personal problem," Park said in a statement released through the ministry.

He then said he deserves to take responsibility for all problems incurred in the process of the ownership transfer.

A former star shooter from the 1970s and '80s, Park made a media splash when he became the country's first athlete-turned-vice minister in March.

Shortly before assuming the job, he established a corporate body headed by his wife to take over the ownership of the shooting range that he ran for two years from 2011. By law, civil servants are banned from having a second job.

The corporation was required to submit to the tax authority a letter of permission from the Seoul Metropolitan Government approving the use of the city-owned land for the purpose of operating the shooting range, according to media reports.

Instead of winning a new permission under the corporate body, however, the vice minister doctored and submitted an old letter issued to him, they said. (Yonhap News)