Tokyo: Yoshinori Ono, former head of Japan’s Defense Agency, now the Defense Ministry, died of old age at a Tokyo hospital Sunday. He was 87.

After working for the Ministry of Finance, Ono, a native of the western Japan prefecture of Kagawa, was elected to the House of Representatives for the first time in 1986.

Ono, who was a member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, was elected to the Lower House eight times in total.

JIJI Press