Tokyo: With Sunday marking half a year since former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot to death during a campaign stump speech, the National Police Agency is preparing for ramped-up security measures to be implemented on the occasion of unified local elections in April.

The agency conducted a drastic review of its protection for dignitaries and introduced a scheme to check the protection plans of prefectural police in advance.

It examined about 1,000 such plans by the end of last November.

It is conducting surveys of speech sites ahead of the April polls, the first major test for the agency’s revamped security arrangements.

On July 8 last year, Abe was fatally shot from behind while the former prime minister was giving a campaign speech outdoors in the western Japan city of Nara.

Last August, the NPA concluded after a probe that the Nara prefectural police department failed to prevent the shooting of Abe due to issues in the stage of developing its security plan and also in on-site guarding activities, which made the local police unable to sufficiently guard the area behind the former prime minister.

In the same month, the agency revised its guidelines stipulating necessary matters for protecting dignitaries.

It established a new guard section dedicated to offering protection and security for dignitaries and the Emperor last November.

The revised guidelines set standards for local police forces to create security plans, based on information gathered by the NPA on domestic and international terrorism.

The agency requires local police to report on their draft security plans and screens them in advance, and also checks the results after implementation of such plans.

According to the NPA, it screened some 1,000 draft security plans over the three months since it began the new scheme.

At the outset, the agency sought modifications in about 95 pct of such plans including over the deployment of security guards and the use of equipment and materials.

The proportion is believed to be gradually declining.

The first test for the new system will be the unified local elections in April, as politicians and voters will come close to each other during campaigning.

In some outdoor speech events, police will have to cover all directions around politicians.

The NPA is expected to check a large number of draft security plans ahead of the elections.

The burden is also seen falling on the shoulders of local police, as they may be forced to take unscheduled, urgent action, as was the case for guarding Abe, who decided just the day before to give the stump speech in Nara.

To prepare for such circumstances, the agency and local police jointly carried out advance surveys of sites expected to be used for stump speeches.

Some police have begun providing information on locations with safety concerns to political parties.

“The new security scheme is taking root, but there are many issues to be addressed such as discrepancies in the capabilities of police forces,” a senior NPA official said.

“We will work to prevent incidents similar (to the Abe shooting) from happening again.”

JIJI Press