After Trump, Shinzo Abe's widow meets Putin
Akie Abe was not in Russia in an official capacity, and Tokyo -- whose relations with Moscow are frosty -- said Friday it had not communicated with the 62-year-old about the visit.
Putin said it had been Shinzo Abe's "dream" to conclude "a peace treaty between our nations", according to a Kremlin statement in English published on Thursday.
"The current situation differs; we will not address that aspect today," Putin said, offering Abe flowers and reportedly his presidential limousine to go to a ballet at the Bolshoi Theatre.
While Putin made a trip to Shinzo Abe's little-visited home prefecture Yamaguchi in 2016, Japan-Russia relations -- while never warm -- have deteriorated sharply since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Akie Abe, who also met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in September, said her late husband had met Putin no fewer than 27 times.
"I might add that even after the onset of the challenging situation concerning Ukraine, my husband hoped to meet with you. Regrettably, circumstances prevented further meetings: his life was cut short," the Kremlin quoted Abe as saying.
Born to a wealthy Japanese family, she married Shinzo Abe in 1987 and rose to prominence during his terms as prime minister from 2006-7 and 2012-20.
As Japan's longest-serving premier, Abe became one of the country's most recognisable political figures, known for cultivating international alliances and his "Abenomics" economic strategy.
He was shot and killed while speaking at a political campaign rally on July 8, 2022.
Shinzo Abe was also close to Trump during the US president's first term, gifting him a gold-coloured golf club that the American admitted in 2023 to temporarily misplacing.
© 2025 AFP
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
France 24
an hour ago
- France 24
Navalny widow launches TV channel to fight Russia 'censorship'
The channel, called Future of Russia, will be broadcast via a free-to-air satellite platform run by the press freedom advocacy group Reporters Without Borders, known by its French abbreviation RSF. Navalny's team hopes to get greater exposure and better reach with the help of the satellite broadcasts, which will feature content that Navalny's team is producing for their YouTube channels in exile. "I think it will be a long collaboration," Yulia Navalnaya told reporters in a short statement in Paris. She said Navalny's team was doing "our best" to keep reaching Russians on YouTube but the Kremlin has often tried to block the Western platform. "There is almost full censorship in Russia, and under a dictatorship it is very difficult to spread information," she said. Since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow has outlawed all forms of public dissent and banned independent media and western social media. "We think it's really important that we are able to reach the Russian population as much as we can," said RSF head Thibaut Bruttin. The channel will launch on Wednesday, June 4, the day Navalny would have turned 49. The charismatic Navalny, Putin's main opponent, suddenly died in an Arctic penal colony on February 16, 2024. His family and supporters say he was killed on orders from Putin. Jim Phillipoff, project director of Svoboda Satellite at RSF, said the channel was important because it was bringing the content produced by Navalny's team to Russian-speaking broadcast audiences. He described the Navalny team as "pioneers" in countering years of Kremlin propaganda that combines "the glitz and glamour of western television" with Soviet-style messaging. "There's virtually no way to significantly penetrate the traditional television space in Russia except by satellite," Phillipoff added. Approximately 45 percent of Russians use satellite signals to watch television, he noted. With all top Kremlin critics either behind bars or in exile, Navalny's legacy has been fading in Russia.
France 24
an hour ago
- France 24
New police search begins in hunt for missing Madeleine McCann
Madeleine was just three years old when she vanished from an apartment on the Algarve coast where she was on holiday with her family, sparking a global campaign to find her and unprecedented media coverage. A previous search of a lake near the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz in 2023 yielded no results but on Tuesday investigators were back in a part of nearby Lagos to hunt for clues. Several police vehicles with Portuguese and German number plates as well as fire trucks were seen down a cordoned-off dirt road towards the search site, AFP journalists at the scene saw. Portuguese police said about 25 German investigators were present, with the investigation looking at an abandoned building in an overgrown wooded area. The new searches -- carried out at the request of German authorities investigating Christian Brueckner, a convicted rapist who is suspected of having killed Madeleine -- are expected to last until Friday. According to the British tabloid The Sun, investigators are equipped with ground radar technology that can scan the ground down to 4.5 metres (15 feet) in depth. The area includes a cottage where Brueckner was living and is dotted with wells and ditches, it added. A mobile phone registered in Brueckner's name was traced close to the family's accommodation on the night Madeleine went missing. Determined Brueckner, a 48-year-old German national, is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence in Germany for the rape in 2005 of a 72-year-old American woman in Praia da Luz. He is due to complete his sentence in September. He was acquitted in October 2024 in Germany at trial for two sexual assaults and three rapes committed in Portugal between 2000 and 2017. German authorities in 2020 said they were convinced Brueckner was involved in Madeleine's disappearance, which gained worldwide publicity and has seen several false leads. He has not been charged in connection with the McCann case. Brueckner, who according to German media had a string of previous convictions, including for sexual offences, assault and theft before he was convicted of rape, worked as an odd-job man during his 10 years in the Algarve. He also burgled hotel rooms and holiday apartments. At the time of Madeleine's disappearance he was living in a camper van. On Tuesday, a journalist from Germany's RTL television recounted his correspondence with Brueckner, and how he had met him in prison. Brueckner, the journalist said, complained that "half the world" considered him to be a "cruel rapist". He said he wanted to eat steak and drink beer when he is released from prison. A former neighbour in Portugal had told Sky News television in 2020 that Brueckner was "always a bit angry, driving fast up and down the lane, and then one day, around 2006, he just disappeared without a word". He returned to Germany in 2007 -- the year Madeleine disappeared -- settling in Hanover, but still spent time in Portugal. On the 18th anniversary of their daughter's disappearance on May 3 this year, Madeleine's parents Kate and Gerry McCann said they were still determined to find out what happened. "We will do our utmost to achieve this."
Euronews
an hour ago
- Euronews
Police officer who shot teenager dead in 2023 to be tried for murder
A French police officer will face a murder trial next year over the 2023 killing of teenager Nahel Merzouk, a decision reached at the end of a two-year investigation. The trial of the 38-year-old officer could take place in the second or third quarter of 2026, the court and prosecutor in the Paris suburb of Nanterre, where the killing at point-blank range took place, said in a joint statement. The lawyer for Merzouk's mother, Frank Berton, welcomed the order for a trial. "We are just seeing the law being applied (...) Now all that remains is to convince the court," he told the AFP news agency. Meanwhile, the defendant's lawyer criticised the decision, adding it was "both disappointing and not surprising." "The investigating judge would have had to be courageous to take a different position than that of the prosecution," Laurent-Franck Liénard, the officer's lawyer, told AFP, adding that he would lodge an appeal against the order. "We maintain that the shooting was legitimate," he said. The officer, identified by domestic media as Florian M., was charged with Merzouk's murder. He was released from custody in November 2023 after five months in detention pending further investigation. He is currently under judicial supervision, meaning his movements are restricted. Merzouk, a teenager of North African descent, was shot dead on 27 June 2023 as he pulled away from police during a traffic stop. Police initially maintained that Merzouk had driven his car at the officer. However, this was contradicted by a video which showed two officers standing outside a stationary car, with one pointing a weapon at its driver. A voice was heard saying: "You are going to get a bullet in the head." Video footage of the shooting itself went viral and sparked protests that escalated into rioting and led to scenes of devastation nationwide. Thousands of people were arrested as the government ratcheted up its law enforcement response to quell the unrest, injuring hundreds. Between 2022 and Merzouk's murder the next year, 15 people were killed by police during traffic stops. Not all officers were charged. After the death of Merzouk, the UN called on France to address "the deep-rooted problems of racism and racial discrimination" in its police force. Meanwhile, the Council of Europe's human rights monitoring body (ECRI) warned last month that law enforcement officials across Europe continue to use racial profiling. It has long recommended that French authorities introduce an effective system of recording identity checks by law enforcement officers. "France is one country of concern when it comes to racial profiling," Bertil Cottier, chair of the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI), told Euronews. "We noticed a couple of months ago sadly that our recommendation on combating racial profiling — in particular on tracing the police officers who (incorrectly) stopped people — has been ignored so far," he added.
