Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe assassinated during speech
NARA, Japan – Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot in the chest while making a campaign speech in western Japan on Friday. The gunman is in custody.
Abe, 67, was shot from behind while campaigning for a candidate in an upcoming parliamentary election at 11:30 a.m. local time. He was said to have been in cardiac arrest and showing no vital signs when he was airlifted to a hospital.
Although he received over 100 units of blood, Reuters reported Abe bled to death from deep wounds to the heart and the right side of his neck, and he was pronounced dead at 5:03 p.m.
The shooter, Tetsuya Yamagami, 41, was arrested at the scene. He is a resident of Nara, and served three years in the Japanese Navy in the early 2000s. Witnesses at the scene told public broadcaster NHK that the suspect did not appear to attempt to flee after shooting Abe.
Japanese media has reported that the weapon appears to be a homemade short-barreled shotgun. NHK has said that Yamagami told police he was dissatisfied with Abe and wanted to kill him, and that he has made multiple handmade explosives and guns in the past.
Photos and videos of the attack were quickly shared on social media.
Video of Abe arriving at the hospital
Japan has extremely strict gun laws and shootings are rare. In 1960, the head of the Japan Socialist party was assassinated during a speech by a right-wing youth with a samurai sword, and the mayor of Nagasaki was shot and killed by a yakuza gangster, but this is the first attack on a Japanese leader, former or sitting, since a coup attempt in 1936 in which several figures that included two ex-premiers were killed.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his Cabinet ministers returned to Tokyo from other campaign events around the country after the shooting, which he called “dastardly and barbaric.”
Abe was one of Japan’s most influential politicians. He was the longest-serving prime minister, has been in office from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2012 to 2020. Although he left office in 2020, he remained a lower house lawmaker and led the biggest faction in the ruling party.
President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump reacted to the news of Abe’s death.
Biden was deeply saddened by the news and said Abe was a champion of the friendship between the U.S. and Japan.
Trump said that history will be kind to Abe and he will be greatly missed.
