Japan’s LDP picks Shigeru Ishiba as PM Fumio Kishida’s successor

Former defence minister Shigeru Ishiba will become Japan’s next prime minister after winning the ruling party’s leadership vote on Friday, the official count showed.

Ishiba, 67, beat hawkish Sanae Takaichi, who would have been the country’s first ever woman leader, in a run-off.

Ishiba faces down regional security threats, from an increasingly assertive China and its deepening ties with Russia to North Korea’s banned missile tests.

At home, he will be tasked with breathing life into the economy, as the central bank moves away from decades of monetary easing that has slashed the value of the yen.

The scramble to replace current premier Fumio Kishida was sparked in August when he announced his intention to step down over a series of scandals that plunged the Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) ratings to record lows.