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 News from Around the Americas | August 2005 
Thousands Mark Hiroshima A-Bomb 60th Anniversary
 George Nishiyama - Reuters
| | A mother holds her daughter and prays before the cenotaph for A-bomb victims at the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima. With prayers and flowers, residents of Hiroshima began marking the 60th anniversary of the world's first nuclear bombing which claimed more than 140,000 lives. (Photo: Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP) |
Tens of thousands of people from around the world gathered in Hiroshima on Saturday to renew calls for the abolition of nuclear arms on the 60th anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city.
Under a blazing summer sun, survivors and families of victims assembled at the Peace Memorial Park near "ground zero," the spot where the bomb detonated on Aug. 6, 1945, killing thousands and leveling the city.
The anniversary comes as regional powers meet in Beijing to urge North Korea to give up its nuclear program, seen by Tokyo as a threat and one of the reasons behind rising calls in Japan to strengthen its defense and seek closer military ties with the United States.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi was among those attending the ceremony in Hiroshima, 690 km (430 miles) southwest of Tokyo.
At 8:15 a.m., the time when the U.S. B-29 warplane Enola Gay dropped the bomb, people at the park and throughout the city observed a minute's silence in memory of those who perished.
Bells at temples and churches rang and passengers on the streetcars that run throughout the city bowed their heads in remembrance of the dead, including those incinerated while riding the streetcars.
"This Aug. 6 ... is a time of inheritance, of awakening, and of commitment, in which we inherit the commitment of the bomb victims to the abolition of nuclear weapons and realisation of genuine world peace," Hiroshima mayor Tadatoshi Akiba told the gathering.
Akiba said in his Peace Declaration that the five established nuclear powers -- the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China -- as well as India, Pakistan and North Korea were "jeopardising human survival."
The Hiroshima bomb unleashed a mix of shockwaves, heat rays and radiation that killed thousands instantly.
By the end of 1945 the toll had risen to some 140,000 out of an estimated population of 350,000. Thousands more died of illness and injuries later.
On Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the Hiroshima attack, another atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki.
Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, ending the military aggression that brought it into World War II.
Yohei Kono, the speaker of parliament's lower house, said the Hiroshima anniversary should remind Japan not to return to militarism and the world not to use nuclear weapons again.
"We made a mistake in choosing our path in Asia and followed a road to war," said Kono.
"We took away the independence of Korea and we intervened in China using the military ... one of the results of fighting against the international community was the dropping of the atomic bomb."
PACIFIST CONSTITUTION
At Saturday's ceremony another 5,375 names were added to the list of Hiroshima's dead, bringing the total to 242,437.
Koizumi, in brief remarks, vowed to stick to the principles of Japan's pacifist constitution and its decades-old ban on nuclear weapons.
"I am confident that Hiroshima will remain a symbol of peace," he said.
Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party earlier this week released a draft of proposed revisions to Japan's post-war, pacifist constitution that would allow the military to act not only in self-defense but also to take part in global security efforts.
Referring to such proposals, Akiba said: "The Japanese constitution, which embodies this axiom forever as the sovereign will of a nation, should be a guiding light for the world in the 21st century."
Although support for revising the core pacifist clause remains short of a majority, public opinion is no longer overwhelmingly opposed to it. Some politicians even talk of Japan having nuclear weapons, long a taboo.
Even some people in Hiroshima for the anniversary said Japan might have to go nuclear to counter the North Korean threat.
"The best is if talks with the United States go well and North Korea gives up its weapons," said Yoshiaki Onoue, 45, referring to the talks in Beijing aimed at persuading the North to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
"But Japan may need to have nuclear weapons as insurance," said Onoue, visiting the Peace Memorial Park with his family from Osaka, about 300 km (190 miles) east of Hiroshima.
Sunao Tsuboi, an 80-year-old survivor who heads a group of victims, said keeping memories of the bombing alive was his greatest mission.
"As we get old, even among victims the anger, that raging feeling toward the A-bomb, has waned ... Aug. 6 is being played up this year as it's the 60th anniversary, but I wonder about next year." |
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