Shinzo Abe’s killer says ‘I did it’ as trial begins

Tetsuya Yamagami fired a homemade gun at Abe while the former leader addressed a campaign rally in the city of Nara, Japan. He was immediately arrested. Abe was hit twice and died shortly afterward, aged 67.

It took more than three years for Yamagami’s trial to begin, in part because of delays for a psychiatric evaluation.

After the prosecutors’ charges were read out in Nara District Court on Tuesday, Yamagami was asked by the chief judge to respond. “It is all true. There is no question that I did it," he said, according to Japanese news organizations in the courtroom.

The trial started just days after an Abe acolyte, Sanae Takaichi, became Japan’s prime minister with a platform strongly influenced by Abe’s views, including support for higher military spending. The beginning of Takaichi’s term has brought back memories of Abe, with the new leader enjoying high poll ratings and a stock-market surge resembling the one when Abe took office in 2012.

Takaichi stressed her longtime friendship with Abe when meeting President Trump in Tokyo on Tuesday. “Prime Minister Abe often told me about your dynamic diplomacy," she said to Trump. The two leaders signed hats with a slogan used by Abe, “Japan is back."

“Shinzo Abe was a great friend of mine, sad to see what happened. It was so shocking, but he spoke so well of you," Trump told Takaichi.

Yamagami’s defense team is focusing on reducing his sentence after admitting that he is guilty of murdering the longest-serving prime minister in Japanese history.

At Tuesday’s trial, both the prosecutors and the defense confirmed the basic outlines of Yamagami’s motive, which became known in the weeks after the killing.

Yamagami’s uncle told The Wall Street Journal at the time that Yamagami’s mother had donated large sums to the former Unification Church founded by the late Moon Sun-myung.

Yamagami and his siblings sometimes didn’t have enough to eat as children, and he saw his hopes of higher education dashed, the uncle said. Yamagami’s brother later died by suicide after battling cancer.

Blaming the church for his troubles, Yamagami initially thought of targeting Moon’s relatives but then trained his sights on Abe after seeing a 2021 speech at a church-related event in which Abe praised Moon’s widow, prosecutors said, affirming Yamagami’s own account in a letter he sent shortly before the murder.

While both sides at the trial agreed that Yamagami killed Abe to take revenge on the church, they disagreed over whether he deserved leniency because of his upbringing and troubles. Prosecutors said Yamagami didn’t, citing the gravity of the crime and its consequences for Japanese society. The defense team said Yamagami’s suffering when growing up amounted to child abuse and should be considered an extenuating circumstance.

Neither side has yet suggested a sentence. Three judges are hearing the case alongside a jury of civilians. In Japan, a trial continues even after the defendant has admitted guilt. The verdict is set to be announced along with the sentence in January.

After Abe’s death, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party said nearly half of its lawmakers at the time had some kind of ties to the church, including Abe’s brother and others close to the former prime minister.

The Japanese government is seeking to strip the church’s Japanese arm of its legal status as a religious organization. The church is fighting in court against the move, which it says would undermine freedom of religion.

Meanwhile, Moon’s widow, Hak Ja Han, faces her own legal battle in South Korea, where she was charged this month in connection with alleged bribes to the country’s former first lady. The church has said Han is innocent and the victim of religious persecution.

Write to Peter Landers at Peter.Landers@wsj.com and Junko Fukutome at junko.fukutome@wsj.com