The alleged assassin of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe explained the resentment he felt towards the president in a letter he sent to a person who, like himself, was highly critical of the Unification Church.
The police believe that the alleged murderer, Tetsuya Yamagami, had a grudge against this religious organization, which he accused of the bankruptcy of his mother and the disintegration of his family, and mistakenly believed that Abe had ties to the creed.
Before attacking Abe, Yamagami, a 41-year-old former military officer, sent a letter to a person who was critical of the Unification Church and who posted his criticism of the organization on a blog. In the letter, Yamagami said that he “resentful” of Abe, whom he described as “one of the most influential supporters of the Church of Unification in the real world”, although at the same time he affirmed that the former prime minister was not “his original enemy”.
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The alleged killer has told the police that his mother’s donations to the church ruined his family, and his uncle has claimed that these donations totaled about 100 million yen (about 715,000 euros). Yamagami marked Abe as a target after seeing a video recorded in September 2021 by the former president for an event of an organization affiliated with the Unification Church, and given the difficulties of accessing any of the members of the organization’s leadership, against whom he would have planned to attack previously.
Abe died on July 8 while giving a campaign speech in the western city of Nara after being shot in the arm and heart by Yamagami, who used a homemade weapon similar to a shotgun.
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