Trump, wife have dinner with widow of ex-Japanese PM Abe in Florida

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday met with Akie Abe, the widow of slain former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, his wife said.

The former president, who will return to the White House for his second term on Jan 20, and Melania Trump are believed to have hosted a private dinner for her. It is the first known meeting between Trump and a Japanese individual since he won the Nov 5 presidential election.

"It was a privilege to host Mrs Akie Abe at Mar-a-Lago once again," Trump's wife said on X, posting a photo of the three, with Akie Abe in the middle. "We fondly remembered her late husband, former Prime Minister Abe, and honored his remarkable legacy."

Her visit to Trump's estate took place about a month after Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba was unable to hold an in-person meeting with the president-elect on his way back to Tokyo from South America, despite his hope to do so.

Speaking to reporters in Peru after attending an international meeting, Ishiba at the time said Trump's team had explained that the president-elect could not hold talks with him before taking office due to legal constraints.

Since then, however, Trump has held talks with other world leaders, including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and French President Emmanuel Macron.

Among world leaders, Trump was on particularly good terms with the late Prime Minister Abe during his first presidency.

Their warm relationship began shortly after the 2016 presidential election, when Abe rushed to Trump Tower in New York to meet with the president-elect and presented him with a golden golf club.

Abe, who joined him for golf on multiple occasions, resigned in 2020 for health reasons. He was fatally shot during an election campaign speech about two years later.

In February 2017, following a meeting in Washington, the two couples flew to Florida on Air Force One and had dinner together at Trump's Mar-a-Lago mansion.

After enjoying golf the following day, Abe and Trump had to hold an impromptu joint press conference because of North Korea's test-firing of a ballistic missile into the Sea of Japan, the first such launch since Trump took office.

Japanese officials said Akie Abe's meeting with the Trumps was arranged privately, stressing that there was no government involvement.

Ahead of the meeting, some major U.S. media organizations reported that Trump would host a private dinner for her on Sunday, with CNN saying that the two have maintained a close relationship ever since Abe's death.

Trump has regularly called her to check in on her, CNN said, citing a source close to the president-elect.

Ishiba, who took office in October, was a vocal critic of Abe and the late prime minister's defunct faction within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.

He is now hoping to hold face-to-face talks with Trump at the earliest possible time after his inauguration.