Police said former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is in a “state of cardiopulmonary arrest” after he collapsed while delivering a speech in the western city of Nara amid reports of gunfire.
Japan’s public broadcaster NHK said Abe, the country’s longest-serving prime minister until he resigned in 2020, fell to the ground and bleeding from the chest after being shot from behind a gun on Friday morning. appeared to have happened.
NHK quoted firefighters as saying it showed no significant signs.
Media reports quoted police as saying that the weapon used in the attack was homemade. One photo shows two cylindrical metal parts that appear to be tied with black tape to the road near the attack site.
NHK said police had taken into custody a suspect named Tetsuya Yamagami, a resident of Nara, but did not provide any further details. An eyewitness to the attack told the broadcaster that the first shot caused Abe to stumble backwards and fall to the ground after the second shot.
Japan has a near “zero-tolerance” approach to gun ownership that experts say contributes to its extremely low rate of gun crime. According to the National Police Agency, six gun deaths were reported in Japan in 2014, and the number rarely exceeds 10 in a country of 126 million people.
Abe, who was helicoptered to the hospital, was slammed to deliver a campaign speech ahead of Sunday’s Upper House election.
Jiji reported that “terror or violence can never be tolerated,” General Nakatani, special adviser to Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, told reporters. US Ambassador Rahm Emanuel said the United States was “saddened and shocked” by the shooting.
Abe was known for his “Abenomics” policies to pull the economy out of deflation, strengthened Japan’s military, and sought to counter China’s growing clout in a historic two-term tenure.
He became Japan’s longest-serving prime minister in November 2019, but by the summer of 2020, public support was eroded by a series of scandals over his handling of the COVID-19 outbreak, including the arrest of his former justice minister. He resigned without presiding over the Games, which were postponed until 2021 due to the pandemic.