| Okiharu Yasuoka | |
| Native Name Lang: | ja |
| Office: | Minister of Justice |
| Primeminister: | Yasuo Fukuda |
| Term Start: | 2 August 2008 |
| Term End: | 24 September 2008 |
| Predecessor: | Kunio Hatoyama |
| Successor: | Eisuke Mori |
| Primeminister1: | Yoshirō Mori |
| Term Start1: | 4 July 2000 |
| Term End1: | 5 December 2000 |
| Predecessor1: | Hideo Usui |
| Successor1: | Masahiko Kōmura |
| Constituency Mp2: | Kagoshima 1st district |
| Parliament2: | Japanese |
| Term Start2: | 11 December 1972 |
| Term End2: | 28 September 2017 |
| Predecessor2: | Takehisa Yasuoka |
| Successor2: | Hiroshi Kawauchi |
| Birth Date: | 11 May 1939 |
| Birth Place: | Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan |
| Death Place: | Tokyo, Japan |
| Party: | Liberal Democratic Party |
| Alma Mater: | Chuo University |
was a Japanese politician of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), a member of the House of Representatives in the Diet (national legislature). A native of Kagoshima Prefecture and graduate of Chuo University, he was elected to the House of Representatives for the first time in 1972 as an independent. He later joined the LDP and served as the Minister of Justice from 2000 to 2001. He was later returned to the post of Minister of Justice under Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda on 1 August 2008.[1]
Yasuoka was a licensed attorney. He left the LDP in 1994 to join the now-defunct Shinshinto party, but returned to the LDP in 1995. Yasuoka is known to have worked himself and his staff very long hours. He was one of the key participants in the launch of Fukuda's administration in 2007. Yasuoka also chaired the LDP's Constitution Research Commission.[2]
An avid jogger and swimmer, Yasuoka repeatedly swam the 2.1 km-wide Kinko Bay in Kagoshima Prefecture.[3]
In October 2017, Yasuoka retired after doctors discovered his cancer. Yasuoka's son ran, but lost to Hiroshi Kawauchi of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan.[4]
Yasuoka died of cancer on 19 April 2019 at a Tokyo hospital, at the age of 79.[5]
|-