President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) attended the opening ceremony of an event commemorating the life of late Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Taipei on Monday. Abe was assassinated during a public speech in Kobe, Japan last July.
The photography exhibition covers Abe’s life and career, and runs through April 10th at Taipei’s Chang Yung-fa Foundation International Exhibition Center.
The exhibit consists of 30 years worth of photos taken by the Japanese newspaper Sankei Shimbun, the event’s cosponsor, as well as pictures donated by Abe’s widow Akie.
In her speech, Tsai thanked Abe for bringing more attention to Taiwan in the international community even after leaving office. She said that Abe was famous for posting pictures of himself with Taiwanese pineapples at a time when China had banned Taiwanese pineapple imports, which was deeply touching.
After leaving office in late 2020, Abe led the largest faction in his party, the LDP. During this period, Abe made a number of public statements about Taiwan and its importance to Japan’s national security. He once said in a speech that “a Taiwan emergency is a Japanese emergency, and therefore an emergency for the US-Japan alliance.” He also published an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times calling for the United States to end its policy of strategic ambiguity and publicly declare its intention to defend Taiwan.