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Nagasaki Mayor Urge Americans to Help Abolish Nukes on A-Bomb Anniversary
Associated Press for Yahoo News
August 9, 2004
Tokyo, Japan -- The mayor of Nagasaki urged the United States to help rid the world of nuclear weapons, 59 years to the day after a US plane dropped an atomic bomb over the Japanese city, effectively ending World War II.
The attack on the hilly port city on Kyushu island in southwest Japan killed 74,000 people and came just three days after the United States unleashed the world's first atomic bomb used in war on the city of Hiroshima.
The intense heat, shock waves and ensuing fires completely destroyed all structures for four kilometres (two-and-a-half miles) along the city's heavily built-up Urakami Valley.
By the end of 1945, the number of dead from the initial blast plus those who succumbed to burns and radiation sickness was 74,000, or one third of the city's population, with another 75,000 injured.
The annual ceremony of commemoration began with a minute of silent prayer at 11:02 am (0202 GMT), the exact time that the plutonium bomb was dropped above the city August 9, 1945.
"So long as the world's leading superpower fails to change its posture of dependence on nuclear weapons, it is clear that the tide of nuclear proliferation cannot be stemmed," Iccho Ito said in his annual declaration to more than 5,000 people at the city's peace park.
"People of America: The path leading to the eventual survival of the human race unequivocally requires the elimination of nuclear arms. The time has come to join hands and embark upon this path," he said, speaking near the epicentre of the blast.
Standing at the foot of the Peace Statue -- a bronze figure of a man pointing to the patch of sky from which the atomic bomb fell -- Ito criticised Washington for continuing to possess 10,000 nuclear weapons.
He also criticised the United States for conducting subcritical nuclear tests, which contain the ingredients of a nuclear warhead but have no thermonuclear blast and in theory create no radioactive emissions.
"In addition, the so-called mini-nuclear weapons that are the subject of new development efforts are intended to deliver truly horrific levels of force," he noted, saying the radioactivity they would release would be no different to that from the bomb dropped on Nagasaki.
"The city's increasingly elderly atomic bomb survivors continue to suffer from the after-effects of the bombing as well as from health problems induced by the stress of their experience," he said.
"We call upon the citizens of the United States to look squarely at the reality of the tragedies that have unfolded in the wake of the atomic bombings 59 years ago."
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi attended the ceremony and pledged to "make utmost efforts towards the abolition of nuclear weapons."
Masatoshi Tsunenari, who was 16 when the bomb was dropped, recalled the horror immediately after the blast.
"People with burns too horrible to look at and people in agony from severe injuries were desperately calling for help, he said.
On the anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing on Friday, city mayor Tadatoshi Akiba lashed out at the United States and accused it of having an "egocentric world view."
The Hiroshima bombing killed half the city's population -- some 140,000 people -- immediately or in the months after the attack due to radiation injuries or horrific burns.
The loss of life among ordinary Japanese from the two attacks was credited with forcing Japan to surrender six days later, ending World War II.
During Monday's ceremony, the names of 2,707 survivors who died or were confirmed dead in the past year as a result of illness from the bombing was added to the Nagasaki memorial, bringing the cumulative death toll associated with the effects of the attack to 134,592.
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