New Delhi: Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was attacked with what appeared to be a shotgun on Friday while making a street speech in the western city of Nara. He is believed to have been gravely injured.
According to local media’s report, The former leader had been delivering a stump speech at an event ahead of Sunday’s upper house elections when the apparent sound of gunshots was heard, and was bleeding from the neck.
Abe was taken to hospital and appeared to be in cardo-respiratory arrest — a term used in Japan indicating no vital signs, and generally preceding a formal certification of death by a coroner. Several media outlets reported that he appeared to have been shot from behind, possibly with a shotgun.
As per reports, the suspect is a 40-year-old man and has been arrested. He shot the former PM while he was delivering a speech, during a campaign ahead of Sunday’s election for the parliament’s upper house.
The attack was a shock in a country that’s one of the world’s safest and with some of the strictest gun control laws anywhere.
The term heart failure means the heart cannot sufficiently pump blood and supply necessary oxygen to the rest of the body. In Japan, officials sometimes use the term to describe situations where victims are no longer alive but before a formal declaration of death has been made.
Abe stepped down in 2020 because he said a chronic health problem has resurfaced. Abe has had ulcerative colitis since he was a teenager and has said the condition was controlled with treatment.
(VINAYAK)