This is the horrifying moment former Japanese leader Shinzo Abe was shot dead during a political rally Friday.
Eyewitness videos posted online show the 67-year-old political giant calmly giving a campaign speech in the western city of Nara when a cloud of smoke emerges after the boom of an initial shot.
Abe and those around him seem confused at first, with the ex-prime minister slowly turning in the direction of the initial boom — just to be felled by a second blast around three seconds later.
The politician clutches his chest and slowly tumbles to the ground as those around him take cover.
The footage cuts to people several feet away tackling the suspected shooter, identified as disgruntled 41-year-old veteran Tetsuya Yamagami who reportedly made his own crude musket-style gun to skirt some of the strictest gun-control laws in the world.
Other footage shows a shocked silence among those gathered at the rally as emergency services rush to tend to Abe, who was Japan’s longest-serving leader.
The former prime minister was airlifted to a hospital for emergency treatment but was not breathing and his heart had stopped.
Doctors struggled to save Abe, but he died at 5:03 p.m. local time, about five and a half hours after being shot. He bled to death from two deep wounds, one on the right side of his neck, a doctor told a nationally televised news conference.
The former leader had no vital signs when he was brought in. It was the first assassination of a sitting or former Japanese premier since the days of prewar militarism in 1936.
Nara prefectural police confirmed the arrest of Yamagami, 41, on suspicion of attempted murder.
With Post wires
