Tokyo, Aug 7:
Hiroshima on Thursday marked the 81st anniversary of the US atomic bombing of the western Japanese city, with its mayor criticising major powers for waging wars and urging them to stop justifying the possession of nuclear weapons as a method of deterrence.
“Downplaying the inhumanity of nuclear weapons and accepting the use of force to pursue one’s own prosperity risk cycles of violent retaliation that could ultimately result in another Hiroshima or Nagasaki,” Mayor Kazumi Matsui said.
Too many political leaders still consider nuclear deterrence a realistic approach and legitimise violence, which “simply pushes a world without nuclear weapons further into the distance,” Matsui said in his peace declaration at the ceremony at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.
A minute of silence was held while a peace bell rang out at 8:15 am, the time when a US B-29 dropped the bomb on the city. Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who attended the memorial for the first time as prime minister, said she will take “a realistic approach” toward achieving a world where nuclear weapons are never used, within the framework of the United Nations’ treaty to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.