Japan
Japanese say final goodbye to former leader Abe at funeral
Japanese bid their final goodbye to former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Tuesday as a family funeral was held at a temple days after his assassination that shocked the nation.
Abe, the country's longest-serving prime minister who remained influential even after he stepped down two years ago, was gunned down Friday during a campaign speech in the western city of Nara.
Hundreds of people, some in formal dark suits, filled pedestrian walks outside of the Zojoji temple in downtown Tokyo to bid farewell to Abe, whose nationalistic views drove the governing party's ultraconservative policies.
Mourners waved, took photos on their smartphones, and some called out “Abe san!” as a motorcade including a hearse carrying his body, accompanied by his widow slowly drove by the packed crowd. Akie Abe was seen lowering her head to the crowd.
Read: Key moments in life of Shinzo Abe, former Japanese leader
Only she and other close family members, as well as Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and senior party leaders, attended the funeral at the temple.
The hearse made a tour of Tokyo's main political headquarters of Nagata-cho, where Abe spent more than three decades since he was first elected in 1991. It then drove slowly by the party headquarters, where senior party lawmakers in dark suits stood outside and prayed, before heading to the prime minister's office, where Abe served a total of nearly a decade.
Kishida and his Cabinet members pressed their hands before their chest as they prayed and bowed to Abe's body inside before the hearse headed to a crematorium.
On Sunday, two days after Abe's shocking death, his governing Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner won a landslide victory in the upper house, the less powerful of Japan's two-chamber parliament.
That could allow Kishida to govern uninterrupted until a scheduled election in 2025, but the loss of Abe also opened up a period of uncertainly for his party. Experts say a power struggle within the party faction Abe led is certain and could affect Kishida's grip on power.
Kishida has stressed the importance of party unity after Abe's death.
In a country where gun crime is vanishingly rare, Abe’s shooting also shook the nation known as the world's safest and have some of the strictest gun laws in the world.
Read: Abe’s complicated legacy looms large for current Japan PM
The suspect, Tetsyua Yamagami, was arrested on the spot Friday and is being detained at a local prosecutors’ office for further investigation. They can detain him for up to three weeks while deciding whether to formally press charges.
On Tuesday, public security chief Satoshi Ninoyu told reporters he has instructed the National Police Agency to investigate security for political and business leaders.
Abe, the son of an earlier prime minister, became Japan's youngest prime minister in 2006 at age 52. He left after a year in office due to health reasons but returned to power in 2012.
He vowed to revitalize the nation and get its economy out of its deflationary doldrums with his “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms.
His long-cherished goals, held by other ultraconservatives, were to revise Japan's pacifist constitution drafted by the United States during its postwar and to transform Japan's Self Defense Force to a full-fledged military.
Abe became Japan's longest-serving leader before leaving office in 2020, citing a recurrence of the ulcerative colitis he'd had since he was a teenager. He was 67.
Abe's body arrives in Tokyo as country mourns ex-PM's death
The body of Japan’s former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was returned to Tokyo on Saturday after he was fatally shot during a campaign speech in western Japan a day earlier.
Abe was attacked in the city of Nara and airlifted to a local hospital but died of blood loss despite emergency treatment including massive blood transfusions. Police arrested the attacker, a former member of Japan's navy, at the scene on suspicion of murder. Police confiscated the homemade gun he used, and several others were later found at his apartment.
The attacker, Tetsuya Yamagami, told investigators he plotted the shooting because he believed rumors that Abe was connected to an organization that he resents, according to police. Japanese media reported that the man had developed hatred toward a religious group his mother was devoted to. The reports did not specify the group.
A black hearse carrying Abe's body and accompanied by his wife, Akie, arrived at his home in Tokyo's upscale residential area of Shibuya, where many mourners waited and lowered their heads as the vehicle passed.
Abe’s assassination ahead of Sunday’s parliamentary election shocked the nation and raised questions over whether security for the former prime minister was adequate.
Police on Saturday said autopsy results showed that a bullet that entered Abe's upper left arm damaged arteries beneath both collar bones, causing fatal massive bleeding.
Some observers who watched videos of the assassination on social media and television noted a lack of attention in the open space behind Abe as he spoke.
A former Kyoto prefectural police investigator, Fumikazu Higuchi, said the footage suggested security was sparse at the event and insufficient for a former prime minister.
“It is necessary to investigate why security allowed Yamagami to freely move and go behind Mr. Abe,” Higuchi told a Nippon TV talk show.
Experts also said Abe was more vulnerable standing on the ground level, instead of atop a campaign vehicle, which reportedly could not be arranged because his visit to Nara was hastily planned the day before.
In videos circulating on social media, the attacker, identified as 41-year-old Yamagami, can be seen with the homemade gun hanging from his shoulder, standing only a few meters (yards) behind Abe across a busy street, and continuously glancing around.
A few minutes after Abe stood at the podium and started his speech — as a local party candidate and their supporters stood and waved to the crowd — Yamagami can be seen firing the first shot, which issued a cloud of smoke, but the projectile apparently missed Abe.
As Abe turned to see where the noise came from, a second shot went off. That shot apparently hit Abe's left arm, missing a bulletproof briefcase raised by a security guard who stood behind the former leader.
Read: Bangladesh observing state mourning paying respect to Abe
Abe fell to the ground, with his left arm tucked in as if to cover his chest. Campaign organizers shouted through loudspeakers asking for medical experts to provide first-aid to Abe, whose heart and breathing had stopped by the time he was airlifted to a hospital where he later pronounced dead.
According to the Asahi newspaper, Yamagami was a contract worker at a warehouse in Kyoto where he was a forklift operator and known as a quiet person who did not mingle with his colleagues. A next-door neighbor at his apartment told Asahi he never met Yamagami, though he recalled hearing noises like a saw being used several times late at night over the past month.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping, who early on had a frosty relationship with Abe, sent a condolence message to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Saturday, a day after most other world leaders issued their statements.
Xi credited Abe with making efforts to improve China-Japan relations and said he and Abe had reached an important understanding on building better ties, according to a statement posted on China's Foreign Ministry website. He also told Kishida he is willing to work with him to continue to develop neighborly and cooperative relations.
Even though he was out of office, Abe was still highly influential in the governing Liberal Democratic Party and headed its largest faction, but his ultra-nationalist views made him a divisive figure to many.
When he resigned as prime minister, Abe blamed a recurrence of the ulcerative colitis he’d had since he was a teenager. He said then it was difficult to leave many of his goals unfinished, especially his failure to resolve the issue of Japanese abducted years ago by North Korea, a territorial dispute with Russia, and a revision of Japan’s war-renouncing constitution.
That ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China, and his push to create what he saw as a more normal defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the U.S.-drafted pacifist constitution because of poor public support.
Also read: Japan's tight gun laws add to shock over Abe's assassination
Loyalists said his legacy was a stronger U.S.-Japan relationship that was meant to bolster Japan’s defense capability. But Abe made enemies by forcing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition.
Abe was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi. His political rhetoric often focused on making Japan a “normal” and “beautiful” nation with a stronger military and bigger role in international affairs.
Japan is particularly known for its strict gun laws. With a population of 125 million, it had only 10 gun-related criminal cases last year, resulting in one death and four injuries, according to police. Eight of those cases were gang-related. Tokyo had no gun incidents, injuries or deaths in the same year, although 61 guns were seized.
Abe was proud of his work to strengthen Japan’s security alliance with the U.S. and shepherding the first visit by a serving U.S. president, Barack Obama, to the atom-bombed city of Hiroshima. He also helped Tokyo gain the right to host the 2020 Olympics by pledging that a disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant was “under control” when it was not.
He became Japan’s youngest prime minister in 2006, at age 52, but his overly nationalistic first stint abruptly ended a year later, also because of his health.
The end of Abe’s scandal-laden first stint as prime minister was the beginning of six years of annual leadership change, remembered as an era of “revolving door” politics that lacked stability.
When he returned to office in 2012, Abe vowed to revitalize the nation and get its economy out of its deflationary doldrums with his “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms.
He won six national elections and built a rock-solid grip on power, bolstering Japan’s defense role and capability and its security alliance with the U.S. He also stepped up patriotic education at schools and raised Japan’s international profile.
Japan's tight gun laws add to shock over Abe's assassination
The assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in broad daylight Friday shocked a world that has come to associate Japan with relatively low crime and strict gun control.
Japan’s longest-serving prime minister, Abe was shot in the back while campaigning in the city of Nara for parliamentary candidates. He died at a hospital, two days before the election.
The suspect apparently circumvented the nation's ultra-tight gun regulations by building his own weapon. Police said the 15-inch (40-centimeter) device was obviously homemade, and one expert compared it to a muzzle-loading gun. Authorities confiscated similar weapons when they raided the suspect's nearby one-room apartment.
The motive of the man, who was taken into custody at the scene, remained unclear.
Fatal gun violence is virtually unheard of in Japan, and most Japanese go through life without ever handling, or even seeing, a real gun. Stabbings are more common in killings.
Major universities have rifle clubs, and Japanese police are armed, but gun ownership rights have been a distant issue for decades. Even police rarely resort to firing their pistols.
With a population of 125 million, the country had just 10 gun-related criminal cases last year, resulting in a single death and four injuries, according to police. Eight of those cases were gang-related.
Read: PM conveys condolences at losing 'statesman' Abe
The densely populated capital of Tokyo had zero gun incidents, injuries or deaths during that same year, although 61 guns were seized there.
"Japanese people are in a state of shock,” said Shiro Kawamoto, professor at the College of Risk Management at Nihon University in Tokyo.
“This serves as a wake-up call that gun violence can happen in Japan, and security to protect Japanese politicians must be re-examined,” Kawamoto said. “To assume this kind of attack will never happen would be a big mistake.”
Abe’s security team may face serious questions. But because such attacks are extraordinary in Japan, relatively light security is the norm, even for former prime ministers.
In remarks in Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden described the “profound impact” of the shooting “on the psyche of the Japanese people.”
“This is a different culture — they’re not used to" gun violence “as unfortunately we are. Here in the United States, we know how deep the wounds of gun violence go from communities that are affected. And this assassination is a tragedy that all the people of Japan are feeling.”
Japan's last high-profile shooting occurred in 2019, when a former gang member was shot at a karaoke venue in Tokyo.
Under Japanese law, possession of firearms is illegal without a special license. Importing them is also illegal. The same rules apply to some kinds of knives and certain other weapons, like crossbows.
People who wish to own firearms must go through a stringent background check, including clearance by a doctor, and declare information about family members. They must also pass tests to show they know how to use guns correctly. Those who pass and purchase a weapon must also buy a special locking system for it at the same time.
Passing those hurdles will allow a license holder to shoot at clay targets. Hunting requires an additional license.
The weapon used in the attack on Abe was probably a “craft-made” firearm, according to N.R. Jenzen-Jones, the director of Armament Research Services, a specialist arms investigations firm.
He compared the weapon to a musket in which the gunpowder is loaded separately from the bullet.
Also read: Shinzo Abe, powerful former Japan PM, leaves divided legacy
“Firearms legislation in Japan is very restrictive, so I think what we’re seeing here, with what’s probably a muzzle-loading weapon, is not just an attempt to circumvent the control of firearms, but also the strict control of ammunition in Japan,” he said.
Japan's ex-leader Shinzo Abe assassinated during a speech
Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated Friday on a street in western Japan by a gunman who opened fire on him from behind as he delivered a campaign speech — an attack that stunned a nation with some of the strictest gun control laws anywhere.
The 67-year-old Abe, who was Japan’s longest-serving leader when he resigned in 2020, collapsed bleeding and was airlifted to a nearby hospital in Nara, although he was not breathing and his heart had stopped. He was later pronounced dead after receiving massive blood transfusions, officials said.
A hearse carrying Abe's body left the hospital early Saturday to head back to his home in Tokyo. Abe's wife Akie lowered her head as the vehicle passed before a crowd of journalists.
Nara Medical University emergency department chief Hidetada Fukushima said Abe suffered major damage to his heart, along with two neck wounds that damaged an artery. He never regained his vital signs, Fukushima said.
Police at the shooting scene arrested Tetsuya Yamagami, 41, a former member of Japan's navy, on suspicion of murder. Police said he used a gun that was obviously homemade — about 15 inches (40 centimeters) long — and they confiscated similar weapons and his personal computer when they raided his nearby one-room apartment.
Police said Yamagami was responding calmly to questions and had admitted to attacking Abe, telling investigators he had plotted to kill him because he believed rumors about the former leader's connection to a certain organization that police did not identify.
Read: PM conveys condolences at losing 'statesman' Abe
Dramatic video from broadcaster NHK showed Abe standing and giving a speech outside a train station ahead of Sunday's parliamentary election. As he raised his fist to make a point, two gunshots rang out, and he collapsed holding his chest, his shirt smeared with blood as security guards ran toward him. Guards then leapt onto the gunman, who was face down on the pavement, and a double-barreled weapon was seen nearby.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his Cabinet ministers hastily returned to Tokyo from campaign events elsewhere after the shooting, which he called “dastardly and barbaric." He pledged that the election, which chooses members for Japan's less-powerful upper house of parliament, would go on as planned.
“I use the harshest words to condemn (the act),” Kishida said, struggling to control his emotions. He said the government would review the security situation, but added that Abe had the highest protection.
Even though he was out of office, Abe was still highly influential in the governing Liberal Democratic Party and headed its largest faction, Seiwakai, but his ultra-nationalist views made him a divisive figure to many.
Opposition leaders condemned the attack as a challenge to Japan’s democracy. Kenta Izumi, head of the top opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, called it “an act of terrorism” and said it "tried to quash the freedom of speech ... actually causing a situation where (Abe’s) speech can never be heard again.”
In Tokyo, people stopped to buy extra editions of newspapers or watch TV coverage of the shooting. Flowers were placed at the shooting scene in Nara.
When he resigned as prime minister, Abe blamed a recurrence of the ulcerative colitis he'd had since he was a teenager. He said then it was difficult to leave many of his goals unfinished, especially his failure to resolve the issue of Japanese abducted years ago by North Korea, a territorial dispute with Russia, and a revision of Japan’s war-renouncing constitution.
Also read: Shinzo Abe, powerful former Japan PM, leaves divided legacy
That ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China, and his push to create what he saw as a more normal defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the U.S.-drafted pacifist constitution because of poor public support.
Loyalists said his legacy was a stronger U.S.-Japan relationship that was meant to bolster Japan’s defense capability. But Abe made enemies by forcing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition.
Abe was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi. His political rhetoric often focused on making Japan a “normal” and “beautiful” nation with a stronger military and bigger role in international affairs.
Tributes to Abe poured in from world leaders, with many expressing shock and sorrow. U.S. President Joe Biden praised him, saying "his vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific will endure. Above all, he cared deeply about the Japanese people and dedicated his life to their service.“
On Saturday, Biden called Kishida and expressed outrage, sadness and deep condolences on the shooting death of Abe. Biden noted the importance of Abe's legacy including through the establishment of the Quad meetings of Japan, the U.S., Australia and India. Biden voiced confidence in the strength of Japan’s democracy and the two leaders discussed how Abe's legacy will live on as the two allies continue to defend peace and democracy, according to the White House.
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose tenure from 2005-21 largely overlapped with Abe’s, said she was devastated by the “cowardly and vile assassination.” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared Saturday a day of national mourning for Abe, and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres tweeted that he would remember him for “his collegiality & commitment to multilateralism.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian declined to comment, other than to say Beijing offered sympathies to Abe’s family and that the shooting shouldn’t be linked to bilateral relations. But social media posts from the country were harsh, with some calling the gunman a “hero” — reflecting strong sentiment against right-wing Japanese politicians who question or deny that Japan’s military committed wartime atrocities in China.
Biden, who is dealing with a summer of mass shootings in the U.S., also said “gun violence always leaves a deep scar on the communities that are affected by it.”
Japan is particularly known for its strict gun laws. With a population of 125 million, it had only 10 gun-related criminal cases last year, resulting in one death and four injuries, according to police. Eight of those cases were gang-related. Tokyo had no gun incidents, injuries or deaths in the same year, although 61 guns were seized.
Abe was proud of his work to strengthen Japan's security alliance with the U.S. and shepherding the first visit by a serving U.S. president, Barack Obama, to the atom-bombed city of Hiroshima. He also helped Tokyo gain the right to host the 2020 Olympics by pledging that a disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant was “under control” when it was not.
He became Japan’s youngest prime minister in 2006, at age 52, but his overly nationalistic first stint abruptly ended a year later, also because of his health.
The end of Abe’s scandal-laden first stint as prime minister was the beginning of six years of annual leadership change, remembered as an era of “revolving door” politics that lacked stability.
When he returned to office in 2012, Abe vowed to revitalize the nation and get its economy out of its deflationary doldrums with his “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms.
He won six national elections and built a rock-solid grip on power, bolstering Japan’s defense role and capability and its security alliance with the U.S. He also stepped up patriotic education at schools and raised Japan’s international profile.
Bangladesh to observe state mourning Saturday paying respect to Abe
Bangladesh will observe one-day state mourning Saturday for former Japanese prime minister and the country's true friend Shinzo Abe.
The Cabinet Division issued a notification Friday evening.
As a mark of Bangladesh's deepest respect for Abe, the national flag will be kept at half-mast at all government, semi-government and autonomous institutions, and missions abroad.
Special prayers will be offered Saturday for the eternal peace of the departed soul.
Also read: Assassination of Japan’s Shinzo Abe stuns world leaders
Abe, 67, died today after being shot while delivering a campaign speech in southern Japan. He immediately collapsed and was seen bleeding before being taken to hospital.
The attack on Abe, the man who remained Japan's longest-serving prime minister, shocked the entire world.
TIB replies to Japanese ambassador’s criticism of a research report
Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman has appreciated Japanese Ambassador Ito Naoki's expectations of evidence based arguments and said there is no scope of treating any aspect of this research unfounded.
"We want to assure him (Naoki) that globally accepted methodologies including data collection and validation procedures, and other standards of social science research were strictly followed while conducting the study," said the TIB executive director in response to comments made by the Japanese ambassador recently.
The Japanese envoy made some comments on TIB’s recent research report titled ‘Coal and LNG-based Power Projects in Bangladesh: Governance Challenges and the Way Ahead’ while speaking at the second Integrated Energy and Power Master Plan (IEPMP) preparation stakeholder meeting, as reported by the media on July 3.
The ambassador called upon Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) to “present evidence-based arguments.”
Read: Formulate guideline to end anarchy in foreign workers’ recruitment: TIB
He said, "Some description of a recent report by TIB, which came out in May this year… I'm not going into the details of the project… but when this report says Japan has been influencing Bangladesh (to use) obsolete technology, I found it's rather unfounded.”
Adding that the full report and executive summary were earlier sent to the ambassador, the TIB executive director in a statement pointed out that nowhere in the report did TIB say that Japan was influencing Bangladesh to use obsolete technology.
The study only quoted relevant experts, according to whom old and brownfield boilers from China and Japan were being claimed as green technologies and thus Bangladesh was being used as a ‘dumping ground’ for surplus and unused coal technologies discarded by developed countries, TIB statement reads.
Zaman said, “On the other hand, the Ambassador stayed away from taking the opportunity to address the question of conflict of interest of Japan with respect to the IEPMP, an issue specifically highlighted in the TIB report, although the Ambassador mentioned that it was the third time that Japan was involved in preparing a master plan for the power and energy sector in Bangladesh”.
Providing technical support and consultancies by donors are unavoidable and often necessary components in donor-recipient relationships, he said.
"Japanese support in developing the IEPMP is therefore welcome, but they could have set a good example of a conflict of interest-free donor practice by facilitating a credible procurement process in which participation of entities having business and investment interest in the eventual implementation of the plan were to be prevented,” the statement said.
Bangladesh, Japan sign deals on ODA yen loan, grant aid
Bangladesh and Japan on Tuesday signed exchange of notes of the 43rd Official Development Assistance (ODA) yen loan and grant aid of Japan to Bangladesh.
The first batch of the 43rd yen loan amounts to 165.861 billion yen or approximately USD 1.23 billion and grant aid is to provide additional grant for the costs of “the Project for Improvement of Meteorological Radar System in Dhaka and Rangpur,” which is incurred due to the COVID-19 circumstances.
Read: Japan seeks stronger cultural ties with Bangladesh engaging younger generation
Japanese Ambassador to Bangladesh Ito Naoki and Secretary, Economic Relations Division Fatima Yasmin signed the document.
Based on this agreement between the two counties, Hayakawa Yuho, Chief Representative of JICA Bangladesh Office and Fatima Yasmin signed a relevant loan agreement and grant agreement.
“I’m pleased to be able to sign the exchange of notes with regard to 43rd Japanese yen loan package. The first batch of the 43rd round of yen loans includes two projects in the package,” said the Japanese ambassador.
One is to develop roads, drainage and water supply facilities, agriculture-related facilities, and waste management facilities in the southern Chattogram area.
The other is the northern route of MRT Line 5, which connects Dhaka’s MRT transportation network in an east-west direction, will be developed to improve the functioning of the urban transportation network.
Read: Bangladesh urges Japanese businessmen to invest more in various sectors
“With the additional Grant Aid, the Japanese companies involved can proceed and complete the construction work hopefully by 2025. I am sure today’s signings have shown further willingness of the Japanese people to contribute to the fast and sustainable growth of Bangladesh,” said ambassador Naoki at the signing ceremony.
Japan has been the single largest bilateral donor for Bangladesh since 2012, and the total amount of its aid as Yen Loan has reached USD 25.59 billion (commitment base).
Japan seeks stronger cultural ties with Bangladesh engaging younger generation
Japan’s Ambassador to Bangladesh Ito Naoki has laid emphasis on engaging the younger generation in promoting cultural bondage through Ikebana, a traditional Japanese art of flower arrangement.
“I hope Ikebana will be loved by young people in Bangladesh,” he said on Friday while speaking at a function organized by Bangladesh Ikebana Association (BIA).
The ambassador said there is a strong interest among the young students in Bangladesh about Japan, its language and culture.
Also read: Japan honours businessman Abdul Haque with Order of the Rising Sun
He urged the BIA to continue playing its role to further promote the friendship through better understanding of Japanese culture.
Japan honours businessman Abdul Haque with Order of the Rising Sun
The government of Japan has conferred the "Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette" award to Bangladeshi businessman Abdul Haque.
Abdul, one of the founding members of the Japan-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JBCCI), received the award at the official residence of Ito Naoki, ambassador of Japan to Bangladesh, Thursday for his contribution to strengthening Bangladesh-Japan economic ties.
He is the 13th Bangladesh national and the second businessman in the country to receive the decoration from the government of Japan.
"Mr Haque is also known as 'Mr Japan' in the local business community out of respect for his contributions to helping Japanese companies enter the market and resolve their problems. His achievements and contributions to Japan-Bangladesh relations are remarkable," Ambassador Naoki said.
Japan pulls out of Matarbari-2 plant after consulting Bangladesh: Nasrul
Japan backtracked from funding the Matarbari-2 coal-fired power plant after consulting Bangladesh, State Minister Nasrul Hamid said.
"To cut its carbon footprint, the Japanese government made the decision a year ago following a discussion with the Bangladesh government," he told UNB Wednesday.
The Bangladesh government had already decided to develop an LNG-based power plant instead of a coal-fired one at the site of Matarbari-2, the state minister said.
READ: Matarbari coal-fired power project gets costlier
The remaining part of the project area will be used for developing a solar power plant, he added.
Bangladesh already cancelled 10 coal-fired power plants of more than 8000MW as part of its global climate change commitment, Nasrul said.
The country is implementing the 1200MW Matarbari-1 coal-fired power plant in Maheshkhali with the Japanese government's financial support.
The first unit (600 MW) of the plant is scheduled to come into operation in 2024.