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A JAPANESE court in Nara on Wednesday sentenced Tetsuya Yamagami to life imprisonment after he admitted to assassinating former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a campaign speech in July 2022, NHK reported.
AP reported today that the high-profile case has also revealed enduring links between Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party and the controversial South Korean Unification Church.
Abe, one of Japan’s most influential postwar leaders, was delivering an election campaign address outside a train station in the western city of Nara when Yamagami opened fire, striking him in the chest.
Abe collapsed almost instantly, shocking a nation renowned for its strict gun control laws. Yamagami, 45, was captured at the scene.
Yamagami told the court he had originally intended to attack the leader of the Unification Church, but found it difficult to approach him directly and chose Abe as a symbolic target to expose the politician’s connection to the church.
He explained: “I killed Abe after seeing a video message the former leader sent to a group affiliated with the Unification Church. My goal was to hurt the church, which I hated, and expose its ties with Abe, a most symbolic political figure to have the connection.”
Prosecutors had requested a life sentence, while Yamagami’s lawyers sought a term of no more than 20 years, citing his difficult upbringing as the child of a church adherent.
Under Japanese law, the death penalty is an option for murder cases, though prosecutors typically reserve it for cases involving multiple victims.
The revelations surrounding the church’s influence prompted the Liberal Democratic Party to distance itself from the Unification Church and led to court rulings that stripped its Japanese branch of tax-exempt status and ordered its dissolution.
The incident has also accelerated efforts to increase security for public figures in Japan.
During the trial, Yamagami apologised to Abe’s widow, Akie Abe, stating he held no personal grudge against her or her family.
His case drew public sympathy from citizens critical of the church, with thousands signing petitions requesting leniency and sending support packages to his relatives and the detention facility where he is held.
The assassination and subsequent legal proceedings have sparked broader debates in Japan regarding the influence of religious organisations in politics, the rights and welfare of children of church members, and new legislation targeting predatory fundraising by religious and other groups.
Yamagami’s sentencing marks a grim closure to one of the most shocking attacks on a political figure in Japan’s modern history, while exposing deep entanglements between political power and religious organisations that continue to reverberate through the country. - January 21, 2026