On July 8, Shinzo Abe, the former Prime Minister of Japan, died at the age of 67 after being shot.

It is reported that at about 11:30 local time (10:30 Beijing time) on the 8th, Abe delivered a speech for the election of the LDP Senate candidate near the Dahe West Temple Station in Nara City, Nara county. A minute or two after the speech, a man shot Abe from three meters behind him, and Abe fell to the ground in the chest and neck. Security personnel at the scene controlled a suspect named Yamauchi, and found homemade firearms.

Abe was canvassing votes for a Liberal Democratic Party Senator named Kei Sato at the time of the incident. Japan will hold a Senate election this Sunday. At present, the Liberal Democratic Party is busy canvassing for the candidates. According to the website of the Liberal Democratic Party, Abe will have three speeches on the 8th, and the speech at xidasi station in Nara is the first of its kind today.

Zhang Yong, a researcher at the Institute of Japanese Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said in an interview with red star news that the timing of Abe's attack was delicate. Two days later (July 10), the Senate was re elected, which disturbed the internal structure of the Liberal Democratic Party, but the current Yasuda regime would not be much affected. In addition, in view of Abe's years of dedicated management in Japanese politics, the incident may further enhance the influence of the "Abe line" as a political and diplomatic policy.

The shooting disturbed the LDP

The influence of "Abe route" may be enhanced

What impact will Abe's attack have on Japanese politics? In this regard, Zhang Yong said that Japan was originally scheduled to hold the Senate election on July 10, so the node of Abe's attack was a little subtle. At the time of the incident, he was campaigning for the LDP candidate. "According to the previous analysis, there is no big problem for Kishida to win the Senate election." Zhang Yong believes.

According to reports, before the Senate re-election vote, it was predicted that the LDP had a high probability of winning. Zhang Yong said, "on the whole, the previous election was relatively favorable for him, and his support rate was good. If the Kishida government responded appropriately to this event, this event could lead to some votes from the opposition party flowing to the LDP."

Zhang Yong explained that Abe's attack disturbed the internal structure of the Liberal Democratic Party because Abe was the leader of the "Abe faction", the largest faction in the Liberal Democratic Party. On the one hand, this can weaken the influence of the "Abe faction" within the Liberal Democratic Party on the Yasuda government to a certain extent. In addition, how the "Abe faction" will elect new leaders and how the new leaders will affect the Liberal Democratic Party will attract strong public attention.

According to public information, the "Abe faction" is the Qinghe Policy Research Association (hereinafter referred to as "Qinghe research" or "Qinghe Association"), which is known as the "Abe faction" because the current president is Abe. This faction is the largest faction in the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan at present. Its predecessor is the Kishi faction led by Prime Minister Nobuyuki Kishi (Abe's grandfather). It is pro american and conservative, and has a positive attitude towards issues such as amending the Constitution and self-defense, with a strong hawkish color.

Zhang Yong also analyzed that if Abe's assassination would reduce his personal or "Abe faction" influence, but the influence of the "Abe line" as a political and diplomatic policy still exists, and the influence of Abe's political heritage may be further enhanced. He introduced that as Japan's first prime minister born after the Second World War, the youngest and longest serving prime minister after the war, Abe has actively promoted the transformation of Japan's diplomatic security strategy during his more than eight years in power, and his influence on politics is still great after leaving office.

"Therefore, the impact of Abe's assassination is not only huge, but also 'potential', which may take some time to show." Zhang Yong said. He also said that the Nikkei index fell once after the news of Abe's attack. However, compared with the impact of the political level, the event is only likely to cause short-term fluctuations in the Japanese economy.

Challenge people's "safety nerves"

Japanese government may strengthen security to block "loopholes"

Xinhua news agency quoted Japanese media as saying that at about 11:30 local time (10:30 Beijing time) on the 8th, when Abe delivered an election speech for the LDP Senate candidate near a station in Nara City, Nara County, a man shot Abe from a few meters behind him. Abe was shot and fell to the ground, with a gunshot wound in his right neck and subcutaneous bleeding in his left chest. The police arrested a man on the spot on suspicion of attempted murder. The suspected man, 41 years old, is a native of Nara. A gun suspected of being used for murder was found at the scene. It is reported that this person served in the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force from 2002 to 2005.

The tools used by the suspected man, Takeshi Yamauchi, triggered heated debate. According to the pictures released from the scene, the gun used by the suspect is not a traditional pistol, but a homemade double barreled gun fixed with adhesive tape. It is reported that gun violence is rare in Japan, which was once considered to have one of the lowest gun crime rates in the world due to the extremely strict gun control laws. As a country with a population of hundreds of millions, Japan rarely kills more than 10 people every year. Nancy snow, head of Japan at the International Security Industry Council, pointed out after Abe's attack that Abe's shooting would change the country "forever".

"This fundamentally challenged the nerves of the Japanese people, especially the former prime minister." Zhang Yong said. According to its introduction, Japan's gun control measures are fairly good, and Japan has always been considered to have very good public security, and it once claimed to be one of the few safe countries in the world. However, he also said that the incident still showed that there were very big loopholes, especially in the security of leaders, and the Japanese government should strengthen the security of important political figures in the future.

"The key now is to see whether this is an accidental event, and to continue to investigate the criminal motive of the suspect." Zhang Yong told Red Star news that many details need to be further investigated. If the incident is proved to be accidental and other possible premeditations are excluded, the impact on Japanese society will be relatively small. However, it remains to be seen whether such extreme violence will be activated.