\n Japan's Shinzo Abe, who called snap elections Monday, is seen as a pragmatic and canny diplomat who has cozied up to Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin while pushing a nationalist agenda at home.\n<\/p>\n
\n Groomed for power from birth, the 63-year-old is often viewed as arrogant but has also shown a self-deprecating sense of humour, dressing up as video game icon Super Mario as the Rio Olympics closed to give a zany preview of Tokyo 2020.\n<\/p>\n
\n The third-generation politician captured global attention when he became the first foreign leader to visit Trump Tower in New York -- before the now president was even inaugurated -- warmly shaking hands with the tycoon in glittering surroundings.\n<\/p>\n
\n The golf-loving pair then jetted off to Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida for a spot of \"golf diplomacy\", with the US president praising Abe's \"strong hands\" and a \"very, very good chemistry\".\n<\/p>\n
\n This personal rapport proved its worth as North Korea tensions mounted, with the two in regular contact following missile launches by Pyongyang over Japan.\n<\/p>\n
\n But Abe has also cultivated ties with Putin, inviting the Kremlin strongman to his hometown of Nagato for a so-called \"hot spring summit\" as part of a bid to sign a peace treaty formally ending World War II hostilities.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Abenomics' -\n<\/p>\n
\n Abe seemed born to lead Japan, the latest in three generations of powerful politicians.\n<\/p>\n
\n His grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, was a World War II cabinet member briefly arrested for war crimes -- but never charged -- who became prime minister and forged an alliance with the United States.\n<\/p>\n
\n His father, Shintaro Abe, rose to be foreign minister but never won the top job. Shinzo took Shintaro's parliamentary seat in 1993 following his death.\n<\/p>\n
\n Abe cut his teeth by taking a hawkish line on North Korea and became the hand-picked successor to the popular former PM Junichiro Koizumi, whom he served as an eager and earnest deputy.\n<\/p>\n
\n When he finally reached the top of the greasy pole in 2006 he became the country's youngest-ever prime minister -- aged just 52 -- and the first born after World War II.\n<\/p>\n
\n But he left office abruptly 12 months later, citing debilitating bowel problems caused by exhaustion and stress, becoming the first in a series of short-lived premiers, each of whom lasted around a year.\n<\/p>\n
\n Recovered, he swept back to power in 2012 on a pledge to reignite Japan's once-booming economy and carry out \"diplomacy that takes a panoramic perspective of the world map.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n On the economic front, he pioneered a multi-pronged policy dubbed \"Abenomics\", a combination of generous government spending and central bank monetary easing.\n<\/p>\n
\n Figures earlier this month showed that Japan -- the world's third-largest economy -- was enjoying its longest period of expansion in more than a decade.\n<\/p>\n
\n However, inflation is stuck stubbornly below the Bank of Japan's target, as consumer spending remains underwhelming.\n<\/p>\n
\n In domestic policy, he has pursued a nationalist agenda, openly mulling changes to Japan's US-imposed pacifist constitution so it could turn its self-defence forces into a full-fledged army.\n<\/p>\n
\n This has led to tensions with China and South Korea, not helped by his inflammatory visit to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, seen by Beijing and Seoul as a symbol of Tokyo's militarist past.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Arrogance' -\n<\/p>\n
\n In recent months, Abe saw public support plunge over a series of scandals, including allegations of favouritism to a friend in a business deal -- which Abe strongly denies.\n<\/p>\n
\n When his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) suffered a drubbing in local Tokyo elections in July, analysts and media blamed it on the increasing \"arrogance\" of the prime minister and his government.\n<\/p>\n
\n This left him fighting for his political life -- in the words of one observer, scrambling to crawl out of a \"hell hole\".\n<\/p>\n
\n His reputation for arrogance was not helped when he shouted down hecklers at a rally, and voters turned in droves to support charismatic Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike.\n<\/p>\n
\n But he swiftly reshuffled his cabinet and polls showed voters approved of his hawkish reaction to North Korean missiles, giving him a bump in the ratings and apparently tempting him into the gamble of a snap election.\n<\/p>\n
\n On a personal level, Abe is married to Akie, the daughter of a prominent businessman known for her love of South Korean culture.\n<\/p>\n
\n In the early days of his political career, Japanese media focused on how he would walk hand-in-hand with his wife -- an unusual sight in a country where politicians' partners rarely appear in public.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Japan's Shinzo Abe, who called snap elections Monday, is seen as a pragmatic and canny diplomat who has cozied up to Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin while pushing a nationalist agenda at home. Groomed for power from birth, the 63-year-old is often viewed as arrogant but has also shown a self-deprecating sense of humour, dressing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-34715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n