<\/p>\n
\u2013 <\/p>\n
\u2013 <\/p>\n
With flowers and a gun salute, Japan bids farewell to Abe at state funeral<\/strong><\/p>\n With flowers, prayers and a 19-gun salute, Japan honoured slain former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Tuesday at the first state funeral for a former premier in 55 years \u2013 a ceremony that has become as divisive as he was in life.<\/p>\n The ceremony started at 2:00 p.m, with Abe\u2019s ashes carried into the Nippon Budokan Hall in central Tokyo by his widow, Akie, to music from a military band and the booms of the honour-guard salute, which echoed inside the hall.<\/p>\n Abe\u2019s killing at a July 8 campaign rally set off a flood of revelations about ties between lawmakers in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) he once ran and the Unification Church, which critics call a cult, sparking a backlash against current premier Fumio Kishida.<\/p>\n I am traveling to Tokyo tonight to participate in the State Funeral of former PM Shinzo Abe, a dear friend and a great champion of India-Japan friendship.<\/p>\n \u2014 Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 26, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n With his support ratings dragged to their lowest ever by the controversy, Kishida has apologised and vowed to cut party ties to the church.<\/p>\n But opposition to honouring Abe with a state funeral, the first such event since 1967, has persisted, fed by an $11.5-million price tag to be borne by the state at a time of economic pain for ordinary citizens.<\/p>\n In one part of downtown Tokyo, protesters waved signs and chanted \u201cNo state funeral\u201d to the tune of a guitar. *Reuters<\/p>\n \u2013 <\/p>\n Protesters demonstrate against the state funeral for Japan\u2019s former prime minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo on September 27.<\/p>\n Polls show 60% of Japanese oppose the decision to give Abe a state funeral \u2013 only the second for a former premier in the post-war period pic.twitter.com\/xpY1VjgMCk<\/a><\/p>\n\n
\n