Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, an arch-conservative and one of the country’s most divisive figures, was shot and seriously wounded during a campaign speech on Friday in western Japan. He was airlifted to a hospital, but officials said he was not breathing and his heart had stopped. Police arrested the suspected gunman at the scene of the shocking attack in a country that is among the safest in the world and has some of the strictest gun control laws anywhere. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Abe was in “serious condition” and hoped Abe would survive. He described the attack as “heinous and barbaric” and added that the crime that occurred during the election campaign, which is the foundation of democracy, is absolutely inexcusable. Kishida and his cabinet ministers rushed back to Tokyo from other campaign events around the country after the shooting. “I pray for former prime minister Abe’s survival from the bottom of my heart,” Kishida said at the prime minister’s office after arriving by defense helicopter from Yamagata. He said Abe was receiving maximum medical care. Abe, who is 67 and was Japan’s longest-serving leader before stepping down in 2020, suffered cardiac and pulmonary arrest while being airlifted to hospital, local fire department official Makoto Morimoto said. Public broadcaster NHK aired dramatic footage of Abe giving a speech outside a central train station in Nara. He is standing, dressed in a navy blue suit, raising his fist, when a gunshot rings out. The video then shows Abe collapsing in the street, with several security guards running towards him. He holds his chest, his shirt stained with blood. The next moment, the security guards jump over a man in a gray shirt, who is lying face down on the pavement. A double-barreled device that appeared to be a hand-made weapon can be seen on the ground. Nara Prefectural Police confirmed the arrest of a suspect for the alleged attempted murder and identified him as Tetsuya Yamagami, 41. NHK reported that the suspect served in the Naval Self-Defense Force for three years in the 2000s. Other footage from the scene showed campaign operatives surrounding Abe. The popular former leader is still influential in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and leads its largest faction, Seiwakai. Elections for Japan’s Upper House, the least powerful chamber of its parliament, are on Sunday. “A barbaric act like this is absolutely inexcusable, regardless of what the reasons are, and we strongly condemn it,” said Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno. The Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper printed extra editions, which were quickly grabbed by people on the street to read about the shooting. Nara, once the capital of Japan, is located just east of Osaka on the country’s main island of Honshu. Abe cited a chronic health problem when he stepped down as prime minister. Abe has had ulcerative colitis since he was a teenager and said the condition was controlled with treatment. He told reporters at the time that it was “mean” to leave many of his goals unfinished. He talked about 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 angered Korea and China, and his push to create what he saw as a more normal defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the US-drafted pacifist constitution due to poor public support. Loyalists said his legacy was a stronger US-Japan relationship intended to bolster Japan’s defense capability. But Abe has made enemies by pushing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition. Abe is a blue-blooded politician 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 a greater role in international affairs. Many foreign officials expressed shock at the shootings. Our thoughts, our prayers are with him, with his family, with the people of Japan,” Foreign Secretary Anthony Blinken said while attending a meeting of the Group of 20 foreign ministers in Bali, Indonesia. “Abe-san has been an outstanding leader of Japan and a steadfast ally of the US. The US government and the American people pray for the well-being of Abe-san, his family and the people of Japan,” Ambassador to Japan Rahm wrote Emanuel. on Twitter. Former President Donald Trump said it was “absolutely devastating news” that Abe had been shot and wounded. He said on his social media app that Abe “was a true friend of mine and, more importantly, of America. This is a huge blow to the wonderful people of Japan, who loved and admired him so much. We are all praying for him. Shinzo and his beautiful family!” Abe said he was proud to work while leading a stronger Japan-US security alliance and made the first visit by a sitting US president to the atomic-bombed city of Hiroshima. He also helped Tokyo win the right to host the 2020 Olympics by pledging that a disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant was “under control” when it was not. Abe became Japan’s youngest prime minister in 2006, aged 52, but his ultra-nationalist first term ended abruptly a year later, also due to ill health. The end of Abe’s scandal-ridden first term as prime minister marked the beginning of six years of annual leadership turnover, remembered as an era of “revolving door” politics that lacked stability and long-term policies. When he returned to office in 2012, Abe promised to revitalize the nation and pull its economy out of its deflationary state with the “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms. He won six national elections and built a firm grip on power, strengthening Japan’s defense role and capability and its security alliance with the US. It also strengthened patriotic education in schools and raised Japan’s international profile.
