Japan blast suspect Kimura filed lawsuit over election rules
- Ryuji Kimura, 24, is accused of throwing a suspected pipe bomb towards Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at a campaign event
- He is said to have sued the government over the minimum age for standing in elections being 25, apparently wanting to stand himself last year
A man accused of throwing an explosive at Japan’s prime minister had previously filed a lawsuit against the government, a court spokesman said on Tuesday.
Japanese media said the lawsuit filed in June by the suspect, named as 24-year-old Ryuji Kimura, was a complaint about the country’s minimum age for running in elections.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was unharmed after the attack on Saturday, in which a suspected pipe bomb was tossed towards him at a campaign event at a port in western Japan.
Kimura was arrested at the scene of the incident, which occurred less than a year after former prime minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated on the campaign trail.
Under Japanese law, candidates for upper house elections must be 30 or older, while the minimum age to run for parliament’s lower house is 25.
Kimura’s lawsuit argued it was unconstitutional he could not run in last summer’s upper house vote, the Yomiuri newspaper and other outlets reported, citing court records.
An Osaka High Court spokesman said that Kimura had sued the government but his claim was rejected by a lower court.
