"may be withheld due to misconduct or refusal on the part of the Prime Minister (for example, Kiichi Miyazawa). As of 2019, eleven former Prime Ministers of Japan are alive. The most recent death of a former Prime Minister of Japan is that of Tsutomu Hata (1994) on August 28, 2017. Shinzō Abe, who served as Prime Minister from 2006 to 2007, is currently serving and thus is not included on this list. Prime Minister of Japan The is the head of government and chief executive of Japan. The Prime Minister is appointed by the Emperor of Japan after being"
"for 11 September 2005, with the LDP achieving a landslide victory under Junichiro Koizumi's leadership. The ruling LDP started losing hold since 2006. No prime minister except Koizumi had good public support. On 26 September 2006, new LDP President Shinzō Abe was elected by a special session of the Diet to succeed Junichiro Koizumi as Prime Minister. He was the Japan's youngest post-World War II prime minister and the first born after the war. On 12 September 2007, Abe surprised Japan by announcing his resignation from office. He was replaced by Yasuo Fukuda, a veteran of LDP. In the meantime,"
"supported the Japanese alliance with the United States. Abe's ruling Liberal Democratic Party suffered great losses in the upper house election, marking the first time it had lost control in 52 years. Another agricultural minister, Norihiko Akagi, who was involved in a political funding scandal, resigned after the election. In an attempt to revive his administration, Abe announced a new cabinet on 27 August 2007. However, the new agricultural minister Takehiko Endo, involved in a finance scandal, resigned only seven days later. On 12 September 2007, only three days after a new parliamentary session had begun, Abe announced his intention"
"defeated. Koizumi announced that he would step down from office in 2006, per LDP rules, and would not personally choose a successor as many LDP prime ministers have in the past. On September 20, 2006, Shinzo Abe was elected to succeed Koizumi as president of the LDP. Abe succeeded Koizumi as prime minister on September 26, 2006. Koizumi remained in the Diet through the administrations of Abe and Yasuo Fukuda, but announced his retirement from politics on September 25, 2008, shortly following the election of Taro Aso as Prime Minister. He retained his Diet seat until the next general election,"
"Yasuo Fukuda Following the resignation of Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, Fukuda was elected as President of the Liberal Democratic Party and became Prime Minister in September 2007. Fukuda was the first son of a former Japanese Prime Minister (Takeo Fukuda) to also take up the post. On 1 September 2008, Fukuda announced his resignation, triggering another LDP leadership election. Although Japan hosted the G8 summit meeting without mishap during Fukuda's time in office, he himself earned little or no credit from ordinary Japanese, and when he resigned, he became the first of the G8 leaders to leave office. Fukuda was"
"signed Prime Minister Shinzo Abe . Although Abe publicly supported his predecessor's visits to the shrine he did not visit the shrine himself during his term in office. In August 2007, the 16 members of Abe's cabinet all declared they had no intention of visiting the shrine on the anniversary of the Japanese surrender. Abe, who at this point had not disclosed whether he himself intended to go, commented ""Paying homage at the Yasukuni temple, or not, is up to the individual, even for a Cabinet member. I expect people to use their own discretion.""¨ Sanae Takaichi, minister in charge"
"(see Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster), as well as ongoing electric power shortages. Following the earthquake, for the first time, the Emperor addressed the nation in a pre-recorded television broadcast. In August 2011, Kan resigned, and Yoshihiko Noda became Prime Minister. Later that year Olympus Corporation admitted major accounting irregularities. (See Tobashi scheme.) Noda pushed for Japan to consider joining the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership, but was defeated in an election in 2012, being replaced by Shinzō Abe. Abe sought to end deflation, but Japan entered recession again in 2014 largely due to a rise in sales tax to 8%. Abe"
"was considered a contender for the leadership of the LDP in 2006, but, on 21 July, he decided that he would not seek the nomination. Instead, Shinzō Abe succeeded Junichirō Koizumi as leader of the LDP and Prime Minister of Japan. One of his most noted policy goals is to end prime ministerial visits to Yasukuni Shrine. In June 2006, Fukuda joined 134 other lawmakers in proposing a secular alternative to the shrine, citing constitutional concerns. Following Abe's resignation in September 2007, Fukuda announced that he would run in the Liberal Democratic Party leadership election, which would also determine the"
"stint as prime minister, but did not visit at all during his first term as prime minister from September 2006 to September 2007. Abe not visiting the shrine prompted a Japanese nationalist named Yoshihiro Tanjo to cut off his own little finger in protest and mail it to the LDP. In April 2007, he made a cermemonial offering to the shrine, but did not actually visit himself. According to official reports the offering was made by Abe as a private citizen rather than in an official capacity, although it was reported that the card attached to the floral offering was"
"Croatian Morning Star. The decoration was given to Fukuda for his efforts in promoting friendly relations between Japan and Croatia. Yasuo Fukuda Following the resignation of Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, Fukuda was elected as President of the Liberal Democratic Party and became Prime Minister in September 2007. Fukuda was the first son of a former Japanese Prime Minister (Takeo Fukuda) to also take up the post. On 1 September 2008, Fukuda announced his resignation, triggering another LDP leadership election. Although Japan hosted the G8 summit meeting without mishap during Fukuda's time in office, he himself earned little or no credit"
"earlier in their marriage. In addition to his native Japanese, Abe also speaks English. Abe's first cabinet was announced on 26 September 2006. The only minister retained in his position from the previous Koizumi cabinet was Foreign Minister Taro Aso, who had been one of Abe's competitors for the LDP presidency. In addition to the cabinet positions existing under Koizumi, Abe created five new ""advisor"" positions. He reshuffled his cabinet on 27 August 2007. Notes: Shinzō Abe Abe comes from a politically prominent family and was first elected Prime Minister by a special session of the National Diet in September"
"forced to resign as Prime Minister. Fukuda was later instrumental in the formation of the Inter Action Council. He retired from politics in 1990. Fukuda was married and had five children: three sons and two daughters. His eldest son, Yasuo Fukuda, after the sudden resignation of Shinzō Abe, became Prime Minister in September 2007, and remained in that office for one year, making him the first son of a Japanese prime minister to become a prime minister himself. In addition, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi began his political career as a secretary to Fukuda, and the two were very close in"
"July 12, the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe canceled a trip to Estonia for a European tour and instead visited devastated places over in the Kyushu region to view the damage and console residents. He also promised that the government would take action and do everything possible to help rebuild. A total of 37 people have been confirmed dead due to torrential rains which caused landslides and flooding, particularly in Kyushu. Total damage from the storm in Japan were amounted to be US$1.2 billion. Tropical Storm Nanmadol (2017) Severe Tropical Storm Nanmadol, known in the Philippines as Severe Tropical Storm"
"a military. In August 2007, Masuzoe was appointed as Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare. He served in this position until 2009 under three consecutive prime ministers (Shinzō Abe, Yasuo Fukuda and Tarō Asō). Abe reportedly appointed Masuzoe, a frequent critic of Abe's policies, to silence critics who would call him a factionalist. Masuzoe came under fire during his tenure for an incident in which the government failed to match 50 million pension records with their owners, which led Democratic Party of Japan head Ichirō Ozawa to call for Masuzoe's censure if he did not apologize. As MHLW minister, Masuzoe"
"the by-election with support from Prime Minister Koizumi, who visited Fukuoka twice to campaign for Yamasaki. Yamasaki, Shinzō Abe, and Foreign Minister Tarō Asō were all considered candidates to replace Koizumi after Koizumi's term expired in September 2006. Abe was elected Prime Minister on 26 September 2006. In the run-up to the 2009 general election, Yamasaki and Kato considered forming a new party to challenge the beleaguered LDP, and had discussions with both Shizuka Kamei and Ichiro Ozawa. Yamasaki remained with the LDP, and was defeated as the LDP suffered a crushing loss nationally. He was unable to run as"
"on 4 November 2007, leader of the main opposition party, Ichirō Ozawa announced his resignation from the post of party president, after controversy over an offer to the DPJ to join the ruling coalition in a grand coalition, but has since, with some embarrassment, rescinded his resignation. On 11 January 2008, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda forced a bill allowing ships to continue a refueling mission in the Indian Ocean in support of US-led operations in Afghanistan. To do so, PM Fukuda used the LDP's overwhelming majority in the Lower House to ignore a previous ""no-vote"" of the opposition-controlled Upper House."
"by Tarō Asō in the cabinet reshuffle that followed the 11 September 2005 election. He was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs again by Prime Minister Shinzō Abe on 27 August 2007. In 2006, Machimura became chairman of the ""Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyūkai"", the LDP's largest faction. As such, on 14 September 2007, he backed Yasuo Fukuda's bid to become Abe's successor, following Abe's resignation on 12 September. Since 2007, Machimura had co-chaired his faction alongside Hidenao Nakagawa and Shūzen Tanigawa. In Fukuda's government, sworn in on 16 September 2007, Machimura became Chief Cabinet Secretary and State Minister in charge of abduction"
"was absorbed into the LDP, a move which was largely because of the New Conservative Party's poor showing in the 2003 general election. The LDP formed a coalition with the conservative Buddhist New Komeito. After a victory in the Japan general election, 2005, the LDP held an absolute majority in the Japanese House of Representatives and formed a coalition government with the New Komeito Party. Abe succeeded then-Prime Minister Junichirō Koizumi as the president of the party on 20 September 2006. The party suffered a major defeat in the election of 2007, however, and lost its majority in the upper"
"36.4% in the district vote). Due to the characteristics of the Japanese election system, the LDP ended up with 296 seats in the Lower House (61.6%), which enabled Koizumi to complete the privatization of Japan Post. Since then Japan has had three further prime ministers (Shinzō Abe, Yasuo Fukuda and Tarō Asō) who have come to power without there being a general election. On September 1, 2008, Yasuo Fukuda abruptly announced he was retiring as leader. Taro Aso won the subsequent LDP leadership election, which was held on September 22, 2008. Media sources speculated that, in the wake of a"
"Prime Minister is Shinzō Abe, who re-took office on December 26, 2012. He is the first former Prime Minister to return to office since 1948, and the 5th longest serving Prime Minister to date. The Prime Minister is designated by both houses of the Diet, before the conduct of any other business. For that purpose, each conducts a ballot under the run-off system. If the two houses choose different individuals, then a joint committee of both houses is appointed to agree on a common candidate. Ultimately, however, if the two houses do not agree within ten days, the decision of"
"new independent regulatory authority. The plan requires investing $500 billion over 20 years. On 16 December 2012, Japan held its general election. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) had a clear victory, with Shinzō Abe as the new Prime Minister. Abe supported nuclear power, saying that leaving the plants closed was costing the country 4 trillion yen per year in higher costs. The comment came after Junichiro Koizumi, who chose Abe to succeed him as premier, made a recent statement to urge the government to take a stance against using nuclear power. A survey on local mayors by the Yomiuri Shimbun"
"decade that Japanese prime ministers responded with policies to limit amakudari, although it is unclear whether these policies are having any effect. In July 2002, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi ordered that strict ""amakudari"" be ended, because of its association with corruption between business and politics. Koizumi's successor, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe enacted new rules as part of a policy pledge to completely eradicate amakudari in 2007, but his reforms were criticised as toothless (see below) and a campaign ploy for Upper House elections in July 2007. While policy has focused on limiting amakudari to private companies, the number of bureaucrats"
"the two countries refused to meet with Koizumi, and there were no mutual visits between Chinese and Japanese leaders after October 2001 and between South Korean and Japanese leaders after June 2005. The President of South Korea, Roh Moo-hyun, had suspended all summit talks between South Korea and Japan until 2008 when he resigned from office. The current prime minister, Shinzō Abe, has made several visits to the shrine, the most recent being in December 2013. Most anthropologists and historians acknowledge that Japan has historically been actively engaged with its neighbors China and Korea, as well as Southeast Asia. Among"
"planned to increase that share to 40%. Nuclear energy was a national strategic priority in Japan, but there had been concern about the ability of Japan's nuclear plants to withstand seismic activity. The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant was completely shut down for 21 months following an earthquake in 2007. The 2011 earthquake and tsunami caused the failure of cooling systems at the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant on March 11 and a nuclear emergency was declared. 140,000 residents were evacuated. The total amount of radioactive material released is unclear, as the crisis is ongoing. On 6 May 2011, Prime Minister"
"Third Abe Cabinet The Third Abe Cabinet governed Japan under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzō Abe from December 2014 to November 2017. The government is a coalition between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito (which had changed its name from ""New Komeito"" in the 2012–2014 term) and controls both the upper and lower houses of the National Diet. Following the 2017 general election the Third Abe cabinet was dissolved on November 1, 2017, and replaced with the Fourth Abe cabinet. Following the snap ""Abenomics Dissolution"" and general election of 2014, Abe was re-elected by the Diet and chose"
"that time, retiring in 2008. His service in the Foreign Ministry included work in the Asian Affairs Bureau, the Treaties Bureau, the North American Affairs Bureau, and the Japanese delegations to the Philippines, the European Community, and the United States. He served as Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs from 2005 to 2008. He was a foreign policy advisor to Shinzo Abe in Abe's 2006–2007 stint as Prime Minister. When Abe became Prime Minister again in late 2012, he selected Yachi to be a special advisor to his cabinet. He was appointed the first head of the NSC upon its creation in"
"the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, Germany has permanently shut down eight of its 17 reactors and pledged to close the rest by the end of 2022. Italy voted overwhelmingly to keep their country non-nuclear. Switzerland and Spain have banned the construction of new reactors. Japan’s prime minister has called for a dramatic reduction in Japan’s reliance on nuclear power. Taiwan’s president did the same. Shinzō Abe, the prime minister of Japan since December 2012, announced a plan to re-start some of the 54 Japanese nuclear power plants (NPPs) and to continue some NPP sites under construction. As of 2016,"
"times; every visit caused immense uproar in China and South Korea. His successor, Shinzo Abe, was also a regular visitor of Yasukuni. Some Japanese politicians have responded by saying that the shrine, as well as visits to it, is protected by the constitutional right of freedom of religion. Yasuo Fukuda, chosen Prime Minister in September 2007, promised ""not to visit"" Yasukuni. There are a variety of derogatory terms referring to Japan. Many of these terms are viewed as racist. However, these terms do not necessarily refer to the Japanese race as a whole; they can also refer to specific policies,"
"for giving a bad image to Japan, calling for lies not to be taught in schoolbooks, and celebrating the 2015 Japanese military legislation. Mizuho no Kuni Mizuho no Kuni Elementary School (瑞穂の國記念小學院, Mizuho no Kuni Kinenshōgakuin) was going to be a private elementary school to be opened in Toyonaka City, Osaka Prefecture. Its backing corporation has been described as ″ultra-nationalist″. Akie Abe, wife of prime minister Shinzō Abe, was honorary principal but resigned after it was revealed that the school had bought land from the government at only 14% of its real value. On October 31, 2014, Moritomo Gakuen, a"
"Abe and Fukuda belonged, stated that the faction strongly leant toward Abe. Abe was subsequently elected Prime Minister with 339 of 475 votes in the Diet's lower house and a majority in the upper house. 2006 Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) leadership election A leadership election was held in the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan on 20 September 2006 after the incumbent party leader and Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced his intention to resign, a year after he led the party to victory in a snap election. Shinzō Abe won the election, (only to resign a year later triggering another leadership"
"elections, the first time since 1989 that the LDP has held an outright majority in the House of Councillors. The third reshuffle occurred in August 2017. <br> <br> R = Member of the House of Representatives <br>C = Member of the House of Councillors Pages at the Kantei (English website): Third Abe Cabinet The Third Abe Cabinet governed Japan under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzō Abe from December 2014 to November 2017. The government is a coalition between the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito (which had changed its name from ""New Komeito"" in the 2012–2014 term) and controls"
"Peace Treaty of 1947. On 21 February 2007, Prime Minister Romano Prodi submitted his resignation after losing a foreign policy vote in the Parliament; Napolitano held talks with the political groups in parliament, and on 24 February rejected the resignation, prompting Prodi to ask for a new vote of confidence. Prodi won the vote in the upper house on 28 February and in the lower house on 2 March, allowing his cabinet to remain in office. On 24 January 2008, Romano Prodi lost a vote of confidence in the Senate by a vote of 161 to 156 votes, after the"
"plan he had championed in the previous five years, Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto announced that he would retire from politics once his term expired in December 2015. A major shakeup also occurred in Hashimoto's Japan Innovation Party, with the leader Kenji Eda and secretary-general Yorihisa Matsuno both announcing their resignation from their posts after the defeat. The referendum outcome was perceived as a blow to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who had supported the plan despite opposition from the Osaka branch of his Liberal Democratic Party, hoping that the Innovation Party would in turn support his efforts to amend the Constitution."