Japan’s former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a divisive hardline-conservative and one of his country’s most influential figures, was shot dead on Friday during an election campaign in the western Japan city of Nara.
According to Kyodo News, 67-year-old Abe was shot from behind just minutes after he began his speech ahead of the weekend’s upper house elections in one of the world’s safest countries.
Here is a list of several gun attacks on prominent figures, including politicians, in Japan in the past:
- In 1990, the then Nagasaki city mayor Motoshima Hitoshi was seriously injured after being shot by a right-winger.
- In 1992, a right-wing gunman opened fire on the then Vice President of the Liberal Democratic Party Kanemaru Shin during a speech in the country’s Tochigi Prefecture. However, Kanemaru did not suffer any injuries.
- In 1994, former Prime Minister Hosokawa Morihiro was shot in a hotel in Tokyo by a former member of the right-wing group. Hosokawa narrowly escaped the incident.
- The then Commissioner General of the National Police Agency, Kunimatsu Takaji, was shot and seriously injured in 1995 in front of his residence in Tokyo.
- Another Nagasaki mayor, Ito Icho, was shot by a member of an organized crime group in 2007.
Gun violence is extremely rare in Japan, which has one of the strictest gun control measures anywhere in the world. Abe, who is believed to have been killed by a self-correcting gun, was provided with the highest security.
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