Kishida attacker sentenced to 10 years in prison for attempted murder

A 25-year-old man was sentenced to 10 years in prison Wednesday over the attempted murder of then-Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in the city of Wakayama in 2023.

The Wakayama District Court handed down the sentence to Ryuji Kimura for throwing an explosive — apparently a homemade pipe bomb — at Kishida on April 15, 2023 at the Saikazaki fishing port while he was making a campaign stop for a parliamentary by-election. The explosion injured two people in the crowd.

The incident occurred less than a year after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot to death in July 2022 during an election campaign for an Upper House election.