Japan tsunami, nuclear tragedy remembered seven years on

People mark a minute of silence for victims of the 2011 tsunami and earthquake disaster at a park in Tokyo on March 11, 2018. - / AFP PHOTO / Toshifumi KITAMURA

TOKYO: Prime Minister Shinzo Abe led a sombre ceremony Sunday as Japan marked the seventh anniversary of a deadly earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster that devastated its north eastern coast and left around 18,500 people dead or missing.

The magnitude 9.0 quake - which struck under the Pacific Ocean on March 11, 2011 - and the resulting tsunami caused widespread damage and took the lives of thousands of people.