A Look at High-Profile Political Assassinations This Century

KOMPAS.com - Japanese former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated Friday, July 8, by a gunman who opened fire on him as he delivered a campaign speech on a street in western Japan, shocking the country.

Here's a global look at other high-profile political assassinations in the 21st century:

— Oct. 15, 2021: British lawmaker David Amess is stabbed to death by an Islamic State supporter while meeting with voters.

— July 7, 2021: Haitian President Jovenel Moïse is assassinated by gunmen who also wound his wife Martine in an overnight raid on their Port-au-Prince home. More than 40 people have been arrested in Haiti for the attack, including high-ranking police officers and a group of former Colombian soldiers.

— April 20, 2021: Chad President Idriss Deby Itno is killed while battling rebels in the north. Hours earlier he had been declared the winner of an election that would have given him another six years in power.

Also read: Shinzo Abe, Japan’s Longest-serving PM, Assassinated

— Dec. 19, 2016: Russia’s ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov is shot dead by a Turkish police officer shouting condemnation of Russia’s military role in Syria, in front of a shocked gathering at a photo exhibit. The gunman was later killed in a shootout with police.

— June 16, 2016: British lawmaker Jo Cox is shot and stabbed to death by a far-right supporter in the English village of Birstall, part of her constituency.

— Feb. 6, 2013: Tunisian left-wing opposition leader Chokri Belaid is fatally shot outside his Tunis home. His killing — followed six months later by that of another left-wing leader, Mohammed Brahmi — plunged Tunisia into political chaos with effects reverberating to this day. No one has been convicted in either case.

— Sept. 11, 2012: U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens is killed when militants storm the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya. Another three Americans died.

— Oct. 20, 2011: Longtime Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi is hunted and summarily killed by insurgents after being toppled in a NATO-backed uprising.

— March 2, 2009: Guinea-Bissau President Joao Bernardo Vieira is killed by renegade soldiers in his palace, hours after a bomb blast killed his rival in the West African nation.

— Dec. 27, 2007: Benazir Bhutto, the first female prime minister in a Muslim-majority country as well as Pakistan’s second nationally elected prime minister, was shot at and then attacked by a suicide bomber at a political rally in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

— Feb. 14, 2005: Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is killed by a suicide truck bomb on a seaside boulevard in Beirut. Another 21 people died and 226 were wounded in the attack, which is seen by many in Lebanon as the work of neighboring Syria.

Also read: Japan Mourns as Body of Assassinated PM Abe Returns to Tokyo