Japan bids farewell to assassinated former PM Shinzo Abe 

Tokyo: With prayers, flowers and flags draped in black ribbons, Japan bid farewell to Shinzo Abe, a polarizing figure who dominated politics as the country's longest-serving premier, before being gunned down while campaigning for a parliamentary election last week.  

The ceremony, scheduled to start at 1:00 p.m. local time, was closed to the media and limited to family and close friends. Abe's widow, Akie, was chief mourner.

Following the ceremony, the hearse bearing Abe's body will proceed through downtown Tokyo, where black mourning ribbons draped Japanese flags. 

Amid a heavy police presence, men in black suits and black ties joined women in black dresses and pearl necklaces entering central Tokyo's Zojoji temple for the private funeral service. 

Onlookers lined nearby pavements under grey skies in the oppressive summer heat and one woman held flowers.

Hundreds had filed into the temple on Monday evening to pay their respects to Abe, who died aged 67. 

From early morning, long lines of people dressed in black, mixed with others in informal clothing with backpacks, formed outside the temple.

Nearly 2,000 condolence messages arrived from nations around the world. 

Last week, a 41-year-old unemployed man, shot Abe from behind, unloading two shots from a 40-cm-long (16-inch) improvised weapon wrapped with black tape.