Shinzo Abe dead: Japan’s former prime minister dies after being shot

Shinzo Abe – Japan‘s longest-serving former prime minister – has died after being shot twice as he made a campaign speech in the south of the country earlier today. 

The 67-year-old, who served for a total of nine years over two terms, was gunned down in the city of Nara around 11.30am as he rallied support for the local candidate ahead of parliamentary elections on Sunday. His death was announced by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party six hours later, shortly after wife Akie arrived at his bedside.

Tetsuya Yamagami, 41 and a navy veteran, was arrested at the scene on suspicion of attempted murder while wielding what appeared to be a home-made shotgun. Police say he has since confessed, telling them he wanted to kill Abe because he was ‘dissatisfied’ with him. 

Witnesses said Abe was about to start speaking when Yamagami approached him from behind and fired two shots, the second of which felled him. Several members of Abe’s security detail tackled Yamagami while others gave the politician chest compressions, before he was taken to hospital via helicopter.

Prime Minister Kishida called the shooting an attack on ‘the foundation of democracy’, describing it as ‘heinous’, ‘barbaric and malicious’, and ‘absolutely unforgivable’. ‘I would like to use the most extreme words available to condemn this act,’ he added.

The shooting is a deeply shocking development in the life of Japan’s best-known politician, taking place a country that prides itself on its low levels of violent crime and has extremely tough gun laws. 

Kishida said the motivation for the attack is unknown, but the fact that it was carried out so close to the upcoming elections and during a campaign speech ‘cannot be ignored’. 

Kishida said ‘no decision’ had been made on the election, though several parties announced their senior members would halt campaigning in the wake of the attack.

Abe first took power in 2006 at the age of 52 – the youngest ever to hold the job – but was mired in scandal and abruptly stepped down while suffering debilitating bowel condition, ulcerative colitis.

He then regained the premiership in 2012 and held the role for the next eight years, before stepping down in 2020 when the bowel condition reemerged.

However, he remains a senior figure within the Liberal Democratic Party which has dominated Japan’s political scene since the end of the Second World War.

‘Former prime minister Abe was shot at around 11:30 am,’ in the country’s western region of Nara, chief cabinet secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told reporters.

‘One man, believed to be the shooter, has been taken into custody. The condition of former prime minister Abe is currently unknown.

‘Whatever the reason, such a barbaric act can never be tolerated, and we strongly condemn it,’ Matsuno added.

The suspected gunman, who was tackled at the scene and arrested, is a former soldier who was in the Japanese self-defense forces and appears to have built the improvised weapon used in the shooting, Radio 4 reported. 

Several Ministry of Defense officials confirmed that Yamagami had been working for the Maritime Self-Defense Force for three years until around 2005. 

 It was reported that Abe had his security team around him during the speech on Friday, but the attacker was able to pull this gun out and shoot him at close range ‘without being checked.’

The former leader had been delivering a stump speech at an event ahead of Sunday’s upper house elections when the sound of gunshots was heard, NHK and the Kyodo news agency said. 

‘He was giving a speech and a man came from behind,’ a young woman at the scene told NHK. 

‘The first shot sounded like a toy. He didn’t fall and there was a large bang. The second shot was more visible, you could see the spark and smoke,’ she added.

‘After the second shot, people surrounded him and gave him chest compressions.’

NHK showed video of Abe making a campaign speech outside a train station when two shots rang out, after which the view was briefly obscured and then security officials were seen tackling a man on the ground. 

A puff of smoke behind Abe could be seen in another video shown in NHK.

A Kyodo photograph showed Abe lying face-up on the street by a guardrail, blood on his white shirt. People were crowded around him, one administering chest compressions.

TBS Television reported that Abe had been shot on the left side of his chest and apparently also in the neck.

The term heart failure means the heart cannot sufficiently pump blood and supply necessary oxygen to the rest of the body. In Japan, officials sometimes use the term to describe situations where victims are no longer alive but before a formal declaration of death has been made.

The government said a task force had been formed in the wake of the incident.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who belongs to the same political party as Abe, is on his way to Tokyo on a helicopter from his own campaign destination of Yamagata, in northern Japan. Matsuno said all Cabinet ministers are to return to Tokyo from their campaign trips.

‘We are all saddened and shocked by the shooting of former prime minister Abe Shinzo,’ US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel said in a statement. 

‘The US government and American people are praying for the well-being of Abe-san, his family, and people of Japan.’

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s special advisor Gen Nakatani told reporters ‘terror or violence can never be tolerated,’ Jiji reported.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and U.S. officials expressed shock and concern over the shooting.

Our thoughts, our prayers are with him, with his family, with the people of Japan,’ Secretary of State Antony Blinken said while attending a Group of 20 foreign ministers meeting in Bali, Indonesia.

‘Abe-san has been an outstanding leader of Japan and unwavering ally of the U.S. The U.S. Government and American people are praying for the well-being of Abe-san, his family, & people of Japan,’ Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel wrote on Twitter. 

Political violence is rare in Japan, a country with strict gun regulations. The gun used in the shooting appeared to be home-made firearm, NHK said. 

In 2007 Nagasaki Mayor Iccho Itoh was shot and killed by a yakuza gangster. The head of the Japan Socialist Party was assassinated during a speech in 1960 by a right-wing youth with a samurai short sword.

‘I thought it was firecrackers at first,’ one bystander told NHK.

Police identified the suspected shooter as Tetsuya Yamagami, a resident of Nara.

Abe served two terms as prime minister to become Japan’s longest-serving premier before stepping down in 2020 citing ill health.

Abe, Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, held office in 2006 for one year and again from 2012 to 2020, when he was forced to step down due to the debilitating bowel condition ulcerative colitis.

He stepped down as prime minister in 2020 because he said a chronic health problem has resurfaced. 

Abe has had ulcerative colitis since he was a teenager and has said the condition was controlled with treatment.

He told reporters at the time that it was ‘gut wrenching’ to leave many of his goals unfinished. He spoke of his failure to resolve the issue of Japanese abducted years ago by North Korea, a territorial dispute with Russia and a revision of Japan´s war-renouncing constitution.

That last goal was a big reason he was such a divisive figure.

His ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China, and his push to normalize Japan’s defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the U.S.-drafted pacifist constitution because of poor public support.

Supporters of Abe said that his legacy was a stronger U.S.-Japan relationship that was meant to bolster Japan´s defense capability. But Abe made enemies too by forcing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition.

Abe is a political blue blood who was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi. His political rhetoric often focused on making Japan a ‘normal’ and ‘beautiful’ nation with a stronger military and bigger role in international affairs.

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel expressed sadness and shock at the shooting. ‘Abe-san has been an outstanding leader of Japan and unwavering ally of the U.S. The U.S. Government and American people are praying for the well-being of Abe-san, his family, & people of Japan,’ he said on Twitter.