Japan votes in shadow of assassination of former PM Shinzo Abe

A voter casts a ballot in the upper house elections at a polling station in Tokyo (Eugene Hoshiko/AP)

Japanese are at the polls in the shadow of the assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe, who was gunned down while making a campaign speech for the governing party on course for a major victory.

Amid voting on Sunday, police in western Japan sent the alleged assassin to a local prosecutors’ office for further investigation towards pressing murder charges.