Tokyo, Oct. 26 (Jiji Press)--Former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda died Thursday at the age of 90, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party said Monday.

As the country's prime minister, he chaired a Group of Eight summit in Toyako, Hokkaido, northern Japan, in 2008 and spearheaded climate change measures. Amid struggles due to a divided parliament, however, he lasted only a year in office.

After serving as secretary to his father, Takeo, a former prime minister, the younger Fukuda won his first seat in the House of Representatives in the 1990 general election, representing a constituency in Gunma Prefecture, eastern Japan, and was elected seven times in a row to the Lower House, the all-important lower chamber of the Diet, Japan's parliament.

Fukuda first took a cabinet post as chief cabinet secretary in 2000 under the administration of then Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori. He was retained as the country's top government spokesperson in the cabinet formed the following year by then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.

As chief cabinet secretary, Fukuda took charge of the country's foreign and national security policies, such as the dispatch of Japanese Self-Defense Forces personnel to Iraq, earning him the nickname of "Shadow Foreign Minister."

Former Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda
Then Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda (center) poses for a commemorative photo with other world leaders at a Group of Eight summit in Toyako, Hokkaido, on July 8, 2008.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]