Nagasaki mayor calls for denuclearization
NAGASAKI—The mayor of Nagasaki called for Japan to move away from nuclear power generation at a ceremony on Aug. 9 to commemorate the 66th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki.
Speaking after a moment’s silence at 11:02 a.m., the exact moment when the atomic bomb was detonated in 1945, Tomihisa Taue told 6,000 participants in the ceremony at Nagasaki Peace Park that Japan should never have another hibakusha, or nuclear victim.
“As a people of a nation that has experienced nuclear devastation, we pleaded that there should be ’No more hibakusha.’ How has it come about that we are threatened once again by the fear of radiation?”
Taue said he had wrestled with the issue of abandoning nuclear energy since the disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant this March. He worried about the effects of denuclearization on industry and peoples’ lives. However, after discussions within a committee of scholars and hibakusha involved in drafting his “peace declaration” to the ceremony, he backed the call for developing renewable energy sources “in place of nuclear energy.”
He said: “I still do not know what the process will be to eliminate all nuclear plants. But, finally, I felt the need to return to the simple and honest starting point.”
He added: “The path toward never again creating hibakusha will in the end lead us to having no nuclear plants in Japan.”
Pointing to the Fukushima accident, Taue asked, “Have we become overconfident in the control we wield as human beings?”
He continued: “No matter how long it takes, it is necessary to promote the development of renewable energies.”
Taue also called for the elimination of nuclear weapons and the establishment of a nuclear weapon-free zone in Northeast Asia.
In his speech, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said: “We will seek to reduce our dependence on nuclear energy in trying to create a society that does not depend on nuclear power plants.”
The mayor of Fukushima city, Takanori Seto, and 43 junior high students from Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, were present. James Zumwalt, deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, became the first official representative of the United States government ever to attend the Nagasaki ceremony.
Officials from three other nuclear powers—Britain, France and Russia—were among representatives from 44 nations and the European Union, the largest diplomatic presence ever.
Over the past year, 3,288 people died from conditions connected to the atomic bombing, bringing the total number of deaths from the 1945 bomb to 155,546.
A representative of the hibakusha, Hisao Matsuo, 83, said he wanted to pass on the voices of all those who had died.
Matsuo was 17 on Aug. 9, 1945, and working at a weapons factory about 1.2 kilometers from ground zero.
He was talking with a colleague when he saw a large flash of light. He was thrown to the ground by the explosion and the roof of the factory was blown off. Neighboring buildings were toppled.
His mother left that morning saying she was going farming. She was never found. Four other relatives died, including three siblings and a nephew.
“It was an inhumane act that indiscriminately took the lives of several tens of thousands of innocent citizens,” Matsuo said.
He also touched upon the Fukushima nuclear accident.
“Many people were exposed to the fears of radiation,” he said.
He pledged to spend the remainder of his life seeking a world without nuclear weapons, war or fear of radiation.
Kenichi Ezaki and Yuji Endo, Asahi Shimbun, August 8, 2011
* http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201108090265.html
Nagasaki mayor: We must do away with myths and face reality
Since the disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant began, I have wondered constantly, “What mistakes did we make, where did we make them, and why?” I have thought not just about factors directly related to the nuclear plant, such as its location or safety, but also about possible causes in our society or ways of thinking. One of them is the problem of myths.
The myth that nuclear plants are completely safe has crumbled because of the Fukushima plant disaster. However, Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been fighting with a different myth for over half a century: that the United States was justified in dropping the atomic bombs because they saved more lives than they took. Journalist Akira Naka shows that this myth is not based in fact in his book “Mokusatsu” (Ignore by silence), but it is nonetheless still vigorously propagated.
Even in America, when you present the facts, many people agree that nuclear bombs are immoral and should not have been used against Japan. That is exactly why Hiroshima and Nagasaki have steadily continued holding exhibits on the bombs around the world. This year, we will set up a new Hiroshima-Nagasaki corner at the United Nations Office in Geneva. We’ve also started a project where we’re offering materials via the Internet so that anyone can set up a small A-bomb exhibit in places like community halls or schools.
There are other myths: the myth that there is no way nuclear weapons will be used again, and the myth that Japan will certainly never possess a nuclear weapon. It is because these are myths that Nagasaki will once again, in its peace declaration this year, call for an end to nuclear weapons, the creation of a non-nuclear zone covering northeast Asia, and enshrining Japan’s three non-nuclear principles in law.
Both Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui and I were born after the war. It is precisely because we are in an age populated primarily by people who did not experience the war or the bombs that we, together with the few A-bomb survivors who remain, must spread the truth to prevent a repeat of past mistakes.
By Tomihisa Taue, mayor of Nagasaki, Mainichi Shimbun, August 8, 2011
* http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2011/08/08/20110808p2a00m0na004000c.html
A-bomb survivor in Fukushima likens nuclear plants to nuclear bombs
FUKUSHIMA — On the 66th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, survivors in Fukushima Prefecture — home to the disaster-stricken Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant — have a unique perspective. One of those survivors is Akira Yamada, 85, the chair of the prefecture’s A-bomb survivors’ association.
“Who would think we would be threatened by radiation twice in our lives? I had never thought about nuclear power on Aug. 6 until now. This year is different, though. We have to think not only about why the nuclear bomb was dropped, but why we built nuclear power plants,” he says.
On Aug. 6 this year, while watching the peace ceremony in Hiroshima on television at home, Yamada gave a prayer for the victims while wishing for an end to nuclear weapons.
On the day of the bombing in 1945, he was a 19-year-old high school student, at home in bed with a fever. Suddenly, there was a flash of light and a strong wind. After hiding under the house’s porch for some time, Yamada climbed to the roof, where he was rendered speechless. Everywhere he looked was flames. He would later see abandoned bodies piled on the road, a sight that burned itself into his memory.
After the war, Yamada became an economist and later served as president of Fukushima University. Since 1981, he has been chair of a Fukushima Prefecture A-bomb survivors’ association. However, the disaster at the Fukushima plant was far more than he ever expected.
“I thought of nuclear power plants as things for peaceful use, different from nuclear weapons. I never expected that they would lead to the spreading of radioactive materials,” Yamada says.
Even after almost five months, that disaster is still ongoing.
“Nuclear bombs and nuclear plants are the same in that they both use nuclear fission, and this disaster has shown that humankind does not have complete control over nuclear power. We have to stop running the plants until we have safer technology.”
The areas of Fukushima Prefecture left deserted by evacuations remind Yamada of the burnt remains of Hiroshima. “The effects of radiation come gradually. The people I’m worried about are the young,” he says, adding, “Government agencies will have to closely monitor residents’ health.”
Mainichi Shimbun , August 6, 2011
* http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2011/08/06/20110806p2a00m0na024000c.html
Hiroshima mayor to urge gov’t to review energy policy at peace ceremony
HIROSHIMA (Kyodo) — Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui is set to urge the
government to review its energy policy following the Fukushima nuclear
crisis in his peace declaration to be read at a ceremony Saturday,
according to the gist of the speech he released Tuesday.
The move follows an announcement by Tomihisa Taue, the mayor of Nagasaki
City, who has said he will urge the government to promote renewable
energy sources in a policy shift in his peace declaration during an Aug.
9 ceremony.
According to the Hiroshima municipal government, it is the first time
that the peace declaration, which has mainly focused on the elimination
of nuclear weapons, has referred to the issue of nuclear power
generation since referring to the Chernobyl accident in 1986.
The speech will be read out at the event Saturday marking the 66th
anniversary of the 1945 U.S. atomic bombing of the southwestern Japan
city at the end of World War II. Nagasaki’s ceremony commemorates its
atomic bombing by the United States three days later.
In the declaration, Matsui will cite citizens’ movements calling for
withdrawal from nuclear power generation in the wake of the Fukushima
crisis and urge the government to review its energy policy "so as to
earn public support and trust." He will stop short, however, of
explicitly opposing nuclear power generation.
The speech also touches on calls from other citizens’ groups urging
authorities to enhance controls on nuclear power and promote the use of
renewable energy.
"I thought it best to show the citizens of Hiroshima that there are
differences in stance over the issue among groups of people," Matsui
told a press conference. "After all, the central government should take
responsibility to deal with the nuclear power generation issue."
The mayor said that declarations in the past have included concerns of
the time in addition to fundamental issues such as the mayor’s vow for
peace and the city’s support policies for A-bomb survivors in and
outside Japan.
Kyodo, August 2, 2011
* http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2011/08/02/20110802p2g00m0dm094000c.html