01 December 2017•Update: 01 December 2017
ANKARA
Japan's Emperor Akihito is to abdicate in 17 months -- the first such departure from the Chrysanthemum Throne in two centuries, the government said Friday.
Crown Prince Naruhito, Akihito’s eldest son, will ascend to the throne a day after the April 30, 2019, abdication, the Kyodo news agency reported.
The agency cited Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as saying the 10-member Imperial House Council had decided on the 83-year-old emperor's abdication date and succession earlier Friday.
The Cabinet is expected to formally approve the decision on or around Dec. 8.
“Today, the Imperial House Council reached its decision without a hitch and I am deeply impressed that a big step has been made for imperial succession,” Abe said, according to Kyodo.
Akihito, who came to the throne in January 1989 following the death of his father, Emperor Hirohito, had previously said that he wanted to abdicate on the grounds of age and health.
Legislation to allow the abdication within three years was enacted earlier this year.
The emperor's abdication will end the current Heisei era in its 31st year. The government is expected to announce the name of the new era next year.
The emperor and Empress Michiko, who was born a commoner, helped to bring the secluded imperial family closer to the public with visits to disaster zones.
They also traveled to former World War II battlefields overseas to pay tribute to those who lost their lives during the war, which Japan fought in the name of Akihito’s father.
Akihito is supposedly the 125th emperor in a legendary lineage believed to stretch back more than 2,600 years. The last monarch who abdicated was Emperor Kokaku in 1817.
