80th Anniversary of Hiroshima

Hiroshima marked the 80th anniversary from atomic bombing on August 6th, 1945. In the Peace Memorial Ceremony, the Mayor of Hiroshima, Kazumi Matsui, asked political leaders in the world to embrace “heart of Hiroshima,” which sincerely hopes world peace. However, his remarks clarified significant gap between Hiroshima and the world in which threat of using nuclear weapons remains.

In his Peace Declaration in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Ceremony on 8:15 a.m. of August 6th, the exact time an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima 80 years ago, Matsui criticized a notion that nuclear weapons can be possessed for protecting a country, referring to military empowerment as seen in Russian invasion to Ukraine or in the Middle East. He urged political leaders in the world to come to Hiroshima and witness the truth of the city suffered from a nuclear weapon.

 

Matsui stressed necessity for nations to “look beyond narrow self-interest to consider the circumstances of other nations.” The phrase may be resonant with the preamble of Constitution of Japan, which says “no nation is responsible for itself alone.” Matsui required the government of Japan to participate in Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons to implement “peace-loving spirit of Hiroshima.”

 

Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba promised in his speech at the ceremony to make his best effort to reach permanently peaceful world without a nuclear weapon. “It is our mission as an only country suffered from nuclear weapons to lead international effort to the world without a nuclear weapon, based on the three non-nuclear principles,” said Ishiba to the audience at the ceremony in Hiroshima. However, Japanese government has been ignoring Hiroshima’s demand for joining the nuclear weapons prohibition treaty.

 

Ishiba also referred to a fact that average age of the sufferers of atomic bomb, or hibakusha, exceeded 86 years old. One of the news at 80th anniversary was that the number of hibakusha has been declined and went below 100 thousand this year. It is a great issue for Japan how the narratives about atomic bomb can be succeeded beyond generations.

 

Although Nihon Hidankyo (Japan Confederation A-and H-bomb Sufferers Organizations) received Nobel Peace Prize in 2024, serious concern on nuclear weapons looks like weakened, as seen in a comment of U.S. President Donald Trump who said U.S. strike on Iran was “essentially the same thing” as atomic bombing on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in terms of ending a conflict.

 

A sixth-grade student in Hiroshima hoped “one voice” with determination based on studies to change the world in his oathat the peace memorial ceremony. Reality of the world, in which threat of nuclear weapons is rampant, is too cruel for Hiroshima and Nagasaki to make a great progress in their movement to promote eternal peace of the world.

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