July 9 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The leaders of China and South Korea have put aside historical grudges to communicate in unison their condemnation of the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, whose nationalist policy led him to clash with both countries on more than one occasion.
Abe provoked a diplomatic conflict in 2013 by becoming the first Japanese head of government to visit the Yasukuni shrine, where 14 World War II criminals are buried.
Likewise, the former prime minister was also involved in a controversy by downplaying at the time the hardships that the so-called “comfort women” went through, sexual slaves, many of them Chinese and Korean, of the Japanese military brothels during the II World War, although he later apologized for his comments and for the role played by Japan during the conflict.
Abe was killed on Friday in the city of Nara while campaigning for a candidate for Sunday’s election to the country’s upper house of the Diet, as a result of being shot by an individual armed with a homemade shotgun, in a Incident still under investigation.
Chinese President Xi Jingping has declared “on behalf of the Chinese Government and people, as well as on his own behalf, his deep condolences for the untimely death of the former prime minister and has declared himself” deeply saddened by this sudden death, “according to statements collected by state television CCTV.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol has also condemned the murder as an “unforgivable criminal act.” “I express my condolences and consolation to the bereaved family and the Japanese people on the death of the longest-serving prime minister in Japan’s constitutional history, who was a respected politician,” Yoon said in a message to his wife. Abe, Akie Abe, picked up by the official South Korean news agency, Yonhap.
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