Sharjah24 - Reuters: Japan on Tuesday prepared to bid farewell to Shinzo Abe, a polarising figure who dominated Japanese politics for decades as the country's longest-serving premier, before being gunned down at a campaign rally last week.
Long lines of people dressed in black, mixed with others in informal clothing with backpacks, formed outside central Tokyo's Zojoji temple, the site of Abe's funeral, from early morning as ordinary people came to pay their respects.
They followed hundreds who filed into the temple on Monday evening to pay their respects to Abe, who died aged 67. His killing on Friday by an unemployed man wielding a homemade gun stunned a nation where both gun crime and political violence are extremely rare.
Keiko Noumi, a 58-year-old teacher, was one of many who came to offer prayers and flowers under cloudy skies to a large photograph of Abe set up inside the temple grounds showing him in a simple white shirt, laughing with his hands on his hips
"There was a sense of security when he was the prime minister in charge of the country," she said. "I really supported him, so this is very unfortunate."
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