A man who admitted to killing former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe has been sentenced to life in prison.
Tetsuya Yamagami, 45, admitted shooting Abe during an election campaign appearance in Nara in July 2022.
Yamagami pleaded guilty when the trial opened at Nara District Court in October, leaving little doubt about the verdict and focusing attention instead on the severity of his punishment.
Public opinion in Japan was divided between those who saw it as a calculated assassination, and others who viewed Yamagami as a deeply troubled individual.
Prosecutors described the attack as an “extremely grave incident that is unprecedented in post-war history”.
The former leader was delivering a stump speech in the western city of Nara when he was struck by shots fired from a homemade gun. Abe, who was 67, collapsed at the scene and later died. The killing stunned Japan, a country known for some of the world’s toughest gun-control laws.
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