Tokyo: A Japanese court has sentenced a 45-year-old defendant to life imprisonment for the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on July 8, 2022, which shocked the entire nation.
According to Thai News Agency, a Nara District Court has sentenced Tetsuya Yamagami to life imprisonment, following indictments filed in December 2025, for a crime deemed unprecedented in Japanese history since the end of World War II. Yamagami confessed in his first court appearance in October to murdering Prime Minister Abe. He was arrested at the scene after using a homemade gun to shoot Abe, then-prime minister, during a campaign rally for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in Nara, western Japan, killing the 67-year-old former prime minister, the country's longest-serving prime minister.
Mr. Yamagami testified that his motive stemmed from resentment over Mr. Abe's support of the Unification Church, or Moon Cult, which he accused of luring his mother into making large donations that left the family in financial hardship. His lawyers used this as a reason to request a reduction in his sentence to a maximum of 20 years in prison, but the court rejected the request. This case exposed that more than 100 LDP members of parliament were involved with the Moon Cult, founded in South Korea in 1954, known for holding mass marriages and with a large following in Japan as its primary source of income.