The News
Shigeru Ishiba will become Japan’s next prime minister after he was elected as the new leader of the country’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party on Friday.
He replaces Fumio Kishida, who unexpectedly announced in August that he would not run again, sparking a leadership race within Japan’s ruling party.
Ishiba, a former defense minister who has called for the creation of an Asian NATO, faces a full in-tray: The governing LDP has been rocked by a series of scandals, relations with China are tense, and inflation is at a 30-year high. Ishiba faces “big tests at home and abroad,” said The Economist.