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Who is Shinzo Abe, the longest serving PM of Japan?

  • Posted By
    10Pointer
  • Categories
    World Affairs
  • Published
    8th Jul, 2022

Context

Former Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has reportedly been shot in western Japan's Nara.

About Shinzo Abe

  • Shinzo Abe, born in 1954, was the Prime Minister of Japan from 2006 to 2007 and from 2012 to 2020. 

    • He had first become the PM in 2006, but resigned in 2007 due to illness.
    • Abe, whose tenure began in 2012, was due to be in office till September 2021.
    • Shinzo Abe was the longest serving prime minister of Japan. 
  • Shinzo Abe also remained the President of the Liberal Democratic Party twice.
  • Abe's career in public life began in 1993 when he was elected to the House of Representatives.
  • He also held the crucial posts of Chief Cabinet Secretary and leader of the opposition in his illustrious career. 
    • Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi appointed him as the Chief Cabinet Secretary in September 2005. 
      • He replaced him as the prime minister and the party's president a year later. 

  • He was the youngest post world-war prime minister of Japan. 
    • He had to resign due to a medical condition a year later. 
  • He brought political stability in Japan in 2022 when he scored a landslide victory. Before that, five prime ministers couldn't even complete 16 months at office. 
  • Shinzo Abe repeated the 2012 performance in 2017, as he led his party to another landslide win. 
    • He became the longest serving prime minister in 2020. 
  • In August 2020, Shinzo Abe had to resign as the prime minister of Japan due to ulcerative colitis. 

Indo-Japan Relation during the tenure of Shinzo Abe

  • The foundation for “Global Partnership between Japan and India” was laid in 2001.
  • Annual bilateral summits were agreed in 2005.
    • However, it was Abe who accelerated the pace of ties since 2012.
  • In first term - Abe, who visited India in 2007, laid the foundation for his concept of Indo-Pacific. 
  • This concept has now become mainstream and one of the main pillars of Indo-Japan ties.
  • In the second term - Abe helped build the relationship further.
  • In 2014, Narendra Modi as PM chose Japan for his first bilateral visit outside the neighbourhood. 
  • Modi and Abe agreed to upgrade the bilateral relationship to “Special Strategic and Global Partnership”. 

Indo-Japan nuclear deal signed

  • When Modi went to Japan in 2014, the Indo-Japan nuclear deal was still uncertain. 
    • This is so because Tokyo was sensitive about a deal with a non-Nuclear-Proliferation-Treaty member country. 
  • Abe’s government convinced the anti-nuclear hawks in Japan to sign the agreement in 2016. 
  • The pact was a key to India’s deals with US and French nuclear firms, which were either owned by or had stakes in Japanese firms.

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