Japan Prime Minister assassination attempt

Overheal

He’s okay. Pipe bombs were used. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was whisked away before detonation but one of the bombs landed 1 meter away from where he was standing.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/15/national/politics-diplomacy/fumio-kishida-explosion-speech/

The suspect is in custody.

seenitall

What is happening with Japan, didn’t they just kill off a PM recently? What’s the story there, Japan used to be the last place on earth to have this kind of thing happening…….?

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481648#Comment_120481648

The incident comes just nine months after the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe with a homemade gun while he was campaigning for the LDP in Nara Prefecture, which borders Wakayama.

The killing of Abe prompted police to revise rules for VIP protection by extending the power of central authorities and establishing a system to assess the level of danger.

and

Prior to the assassination of Abe, other major attacks on politicians in Japan include the fatal 2007 shooting of Nagasaki Mayor Itcho Ito by a senior member of a crime syndicate. Ito died the day after he was shot twice in the back at point-blank range outside Nagasaki Station.

Five years earlier, LDP lawmaker Koki Ishii was stabbed to death by the leader of a right-wing group. In 1994, former Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa was shot while in a hotel in Tokyo but was unhurt.

Star Bingo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481648#Comment_120481648

Damn, they don’t fcuk around. We’ve seen it before that n all

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481648#Comment_120481648

Long history of political assassinations in Japan. Head of the Socialist Party in the 60s was famously assassinated on live-TV with a katana sword. Several attempts on the Emperor's life in the inter-war years. The nationalist writer Yukio Mishima (worth reading despite his kooky politics) staged a failed coup in in the 70s, commited seppuku. Abe's grandfather when he was Prime Minister was stabbed in the same era. Lots of other targetted attacks on politicians over the years.

It's not all Pokemon and politeness there. There's dark undercurrents in their society like anywhere else - their marketing is just better and tourists don't tend to see the underbelly.

seenitall

Thanks for the replies, again I wasn’t aware of that history, Japan seemed like a stable democracy from a far away vantage point I guess. Interesting stuff.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481724#Comment_120481724

It's not all Pokemon and politeness there. There's dark undercurrents in their society like anywhere else - their marketing is just better and tourists don't tend to see the underbelly.

True of most countries to a degree but when you're talking Katanas and Sepekku, we can for sure say nobody does it like the Japanese.

In the west we just snipe our assassination targets, diddy up a car bomb, or send a drone.

seenitall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481808#Comment_120481808

So true! The car bombs, for example, are all the rage in Donetsk and Luhansk these days, I hear :D (although dunno if it counts as West, strictly speaking…….)

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481808#Comment_120481808

There's a certain aesthetic to be sure. Moments before the katana assassination I mentioned...

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481648#Comment_120481648

Historically politicians getting murdered in Japan was actually pretty normal, the last 70 years or so have been a bit of an exception

banie01

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481724#Comment_120481724

Came to post pretty much this. The return of violence to Japanese politics is very unwelcome but it is a resurgence of a long tradition of violent factionalism in Japan. From the Meiji restoration right through to the 1930s Japanese politics was riven with assassination. It calmed a little during the Japanese push into China and then WW2, stayed low key during the US occupation before emerging again in the 60's with the Socialists and then Mishima's strange break.

SortingYouOut

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120481827#Comment_120481827

Morals aside, that's a pretty bad ass way to assassinate someone.