Yuriko Koike
![Official portrait, {{circa|2017}}](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e3/Yuriko_Koike_official_portrait.jpg)
Considered one of the most high-profile and well-known Japanese politicians, Koike has been frequently mentioned as holding Prime Ministerial ambitions. She ran in the 2008 Liberal Democratic Party leadership election, becoming the first woman to run for the leadership of a major Japanese political party, however she came in third place losing to Tarō Asō. In 2017 she left the LDP amid much media attention and launched two parties: the national party Kibō no Tō and the regional party Tomin First no Kai. Kibō no Tō contested the 2017 general election with Koike as leader, however the party underperformed expectations and mostly disappeared after merging with the Democratic Party for the People in 2018. The same year Koike stepped down as leader of Tomin First and officially became independent, however she continues to endorse and campaign for Tomin First candidates in Tokyo and the party still makes frequent use of her image and policies.
Koike has come under some scrutiny from Japanese liberals and Koreans in both Japan and the Koreas for her refusal to acknowledge the occurrence of 1923 Kantō Massacre, which mainly targeted ethnic Koreans, as well as her association with groups that are often labeled anti-Korean. Provided by Wikipedia
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1by Ayumi Sugiura, Satoru Joshita, Yuki Yamashita, Tomoo Yamazaki, Naoyuki Fujimori, Takefumi Kimura, Akihiro Matsumoto, Shuichi Wada, Hiromitsu Mori, Soichiro Shibata, Kaname Yoshizawa, Susumu Morita, Kiyoshi Furuta, Atsushi Kamijo, Akihiro Iijima, Satoko Kako, Atsushi Maruyama, Masakazu Kobayashi, Michiharu Komatsu, Makiko Matsumura, Chiharu Miyabayashi, Tetsuya Ichijo, Aki Takeuchi, Yuriko Koike, Yukio Gibo, Toshihisa Tsukadaira, Hiroyuki Inada, Yoshiyuki Nakano, Seiichi Usuda, Kendo Kiyosawa, Eiji Tanaka, Takeji UmemuraGet full text
Published 2020-04-01
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