One person was injured after an explosive device was thrown at Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida during a campaign event on Saturday. 

Kishida, who was campaigning in western Japan, was not injured in the attack, but a police officer did receive treatment for some minor injuries, according to The Associated Press. Investigators have not yet announced a motive, but police did detain a young man who they tackled to the ground shortly after “the suspicious object” was thrown toward Kishida.

Prior to Saturday’s attack, Kishida was set to give a speech in the city of Wakayama in support of a candidate for local office. Footage of the attack shows Japanese police detaining the suspect while a loud explosion can be heard. After the bang, people scream and run away while white smoke can be seen rising from where the explosion went off. Video appeared to show bystanders grabbing the suspect, who is a 24-year-old named Kimura. Some have speculated that the object thrown could have been a smoke bomb. 

Japanese PM Fumio Kishida was evacuated unharmed after what appeared to be a smoke bomb was thrown at him while he was on a campaign trail in western Japan https://t.co/v6sfftIBO6 pic.twitter.com/PgbSCsQ59F

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) April 15, 2023

“We are holding an important election for our country, and we must work together with all of you to see it through,” Kishida said after the attack as his party, the Liberal Democrats, announced that they would continue to hold campaign events before upcoming elections.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was evacuated unharmed after someone threw an explosive device at a campaign event in western Japan. Police subdued a man at the scene https://t.co/q7U9WXf0mR pic.twitter.com/0nakpBIPiA

— Reuters (@Reuters) April 15, 2023

“Elections are the core of democracy, and we should never tolerate threats or obstruction by violence,” said Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno. 

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The explosive attack occurred less than one year after former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated while campaigning in western Japan. Abe, a center-Right politician, was Japan’s longest-serving prime minister since WWII, serving between 2012 and 2020. 

Tetsuya Yamagami, who allegedly shot Abe in July with a homemade gun, will stand trial for murder and a gun charge, according to the Nara District Court. The charges come after a lengthy mental examination to determine whether Yamagami could be tried.

The date for the trial has not yet been set, but both a panel of civil jurors and bench judges are expected to preside over the courtroom. A conviction could lead to the death penalty, although experts say a life sentence is more likely.

According to police, Yamagami has said that the killing was motivated by Abe’s alleged ties to the Unification Church. Yamagami disliked the church because of his mother’s large financial donations to it, and its influence on the public square is controversial in Japan.

Yamagami could also be hit with additional weapon and explosive charges, as well as charges relating to building damages.

Diplomats from the G7 Nations will be meeting in Japan on Sunday to discuss the Russia-Ukraine War, China, and North Korea. 

Russian oil exports have rebounded to rates previously seen before the nation’s invasion of Ukraine despite sanctions imposed by Western countries.

G7 nations, the European Union, and Australia implemented a $60 per barrel price cap on Russian oil so that their maritime services industries, such as insurance and trade finance, can only offer their services for Russian oil sold below the benchmark. Russian oil exports in March nevertheless soared to the highest levels since April 2020 due to “surging product flows that returned to levels last seen before Russia invaded Ukraine,” according to a monthly oil market report from the International Energy Agency.

Revenues from Russian oil exports meanwhile increased $1 billion last month to reach $12.7 billion, a metric which is still 43% lower than one year ago. The Russian government depends upon revenues from the energy sector to fill its coffers.

To avoid the price cap, Russia must depend upon maritime service industries outside of the G7, which are generally more expensive and less reliable.

The effort from Western nations to limit the Russian oil market has been resisted by countries that prioritize cheaper and more reliable sources of energy. China witnessed a 43% year-over-year increase in Russian oil imports as of two months ago, according to an analysis from S&P Global, which noted that China is willing to “snap up attractively priced crudes” shunned by Western nations. Russian economic actors now use the Chinese yuan more than the dollar as the two nations increase their trade cooperation.

Japan, a member of the G7, will likewise continue to purchase crude oil from a project in the far eastern portion of Russia such that the energy-poor island nation will continue to have access to the natural gas present at the site. “We have done this with an eye toward having a stable supply of energy for Japan,” an official from the Japanese economy ministry said earlier this month in a statement.

Japan has been more hesitant than other G7 nations to express wholehearted support for Ukraine given their dependence on Russian energy. The nation provides roughly one-tenth of Japanese natural gas imports; Germany, which depended on Russia for more than half of natural gas imports before the invasion began early last year, rushed to secure other power sources as the cost of electricity soared more than tenfold last fall.

The International Energy Agency noted that a surprise oil production decrease from OPEC, an economic bloc constituting Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, and other countries with a large share of global oil production, will risk “aggravating an expected oil supply deficit” in the second half of 2023 and “boosting oil prices at a time of heightened economic uncertainty, even as industrial activity slows in the world’s largest economies.”

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President Joe Biden has meanwhile earned criticism for approving the release of 180 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a stock of emergency crude oil created to manage supply disruptions in energy markets, depleting the reservoir even as the costs to refill the stores are now elevated. He also moved last year to enable American oil production in Venezuela and reportedly asked Saudi Arabia to delay oil production cuts until after the midterm elections.