2023-08-09 08:05:15
The Japanese city of Nagasaki commemorated the victims of the atomic bombing 78 years ago with an appeal to the nuclear-armed states. You should “show courage” and move away from the idea of nuclear deterrence, Mayor Shiro Suzuki said on Wednesday at a commemoration ceremony that was significantly reduced because of a typhoon. Because of the hurricane, guests from home and abroad, including Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, were unable to attend this time.
For the first time since 1963, the commemoration did not take place in the Peace Park, but in one of the city’s exhibition halls. At 11:02 a.m. (local time), the time when the “Fat Man” atomic bomb dropped by a US bomber exploded over Nagasaki on August 9, 1945, the participants in the memorial service observed a minute’s silence. In Nagasaki alone, around 70,000 people were killed through direct impact and around 75,000 others were injured.
Three days earlier, the United States had devastated Hiroshima with a low-yield nuclear bomb. Under the impact of the destruction, the Japanese Empire capitulated on August 15, 1945. Hiroshima and Nagasaki became known worldwide as the first and so far only cities to be devastated by an atomic bomb as a symbol for the horrors of war and for peace. Today, the nuclear threat is increasing once more in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
1691568930
#Nagasaki #commemorates #victims #atomic #bombing
