Shinzō Abe: “Towering Global Statesman, Great Visionary” Leaves A World Better Able To Confront China

New Delhi: Professor Tomohiko Taniguchi, Former Special Advisor to Japan’s Ex-Prime Minister Shinzō Abe’s Cabinet and the former PM’s primary foreign policy speechwriter and Ambassador Deepa Gopalan Wadhwa, India’s Envoy to Japan (2012-2015) in conversation with StratNews Global Associate Editor Amitabh P. Revi.

The panel discusses the assasination during a street campaign speech of Japan’s former Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, described by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as “an outstanding leader of Japan, a towering global statesman, a great champion of India-Japan friendship, a great visionary and a dear friend, his tenure as the longest serving Japanese PM, his legacy and foresight in recognising China’s long-term threat, his focussing on reorienting Japan and the world’s focus on the Chinese Communist Party challenge while others were still following an engagement or appeasement based approach, his famous 2007 ‘Confluence of Two Oceans’ speech to India’s parliament, PM Abe’s 2013 speech, ‘Japan is Back,’ at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C., his 2015 speech to a joint session of the U.S. Congress, ‘Abenomics’, ‘Womenomics’, the Quad, Indo-Pacific, working with partners and allies being central to PM Abe’s ‘Free and Open Indo-Pacific’ vision,his national security reform and expansion of the role of Japan’s Self-Defence Forces.