Mr. Abe was shot on Friday during a campaign event. Before he left office in 2020, he helped pull his country out of economic malaise but fell short of his most cherished goal: to normalize Japan’s military after decades of postwar pacifism.
Shinzo Abe in 2019, during his second term as Japan’s prime minister.Credit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times
Shinzo Abe, the longest-serving Japanese prime minister, who made it his political mission to vanquish his country’s wartime ghosts but fell short of his ultimate goal of restoring Japan as a normalized military power, was assassinated on Friday in the city of Nara, Japan. He was 67.
His death, from injuries sustained in a shooting during a speech at a campaign event, was confirmed by Dr. Hidetada Fukushima, professor in charge of emergency medicine at Nara Medical University Hospital.
Mr. Abe, the scion of a staunchly nationalist family of politicians that included a grandfather who was accused of war crimes before becoming prime minister, made history by leading Japan for nearly eight consecutive years, beginning in 2012.
It was a remarkable feat of longevity not only because of Japan’s record of rapid turnover in prime ministers, but also because Mr. Abe himself had lasted just a year in an earlier, ill-fated stint as the country’s leader.
