A nightmare has descended upon the city of Nagasaki again. On Tuesday evening, a gangster shot and mortally wounded Nagasaki Mayor Itcho Ito. The mayor was campaigning for a fourth term in a Sunday election. Seventeen years ago, Mr. Ito's predecessor Hitoshi Motojima was seriously injured after being shot by a rightist who was angered by the mayor's comments concerning the Emperor Showa's war responsibility. Such acts of terror against politicians are unpardonable. The coldblooded murder of Mr. Ito must be condemned as no less than an attack on democracy itself. It is also regrettable that the violent incident occurred in Nagasaki, a city that, having suffered an atomic bomb attack, has a particularly strong yearning for peace.

The man who shot Mr. Ito is an acting head of a gang directly under Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest underworld organization. Taking advantage of an unguarded moment when Mr. Ito had finished campaigning and was walking back to his office, the attacker approached the mayor from behind, drew a handgun and fired from close range. Two bullets pierced Mr. Ito's heart and lungs, fatally wounding him.

The gangster was reportedly angry over his failure to receive compensation from the city for some minor damage that his car sustained in 2003 at a public-works construction site. He complained to the city office more than 30 times, but his demands for compensation were rejected.