The Japan Confederation of A-and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations (=Hidankyo) has received the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize. The confederation has appealed to the rest of the world from Japan the disastrous consequences of nuclear weapons, emphasizing that nuclear bombs would never be used again. Efforts made by the entity was rightfully evaluated: an international norm has been established that nuclear weapons are evil.
LET’S RAISE VOICES TO BUILD WORLD WITHOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS!
The Nobel Prize Committee has honored the Hidankyo as a winner of the Peace Prize because the organization has established an international principle that the use of nuclear arms cannot be allowed from the humanitarian point of view. The Confederation has staged grass-root campaigns with strenuous labors by way of presenting testimonies of survivors-witnesses of the atomic/hydrogen bombs in order to build a world without nuclear weapons.
Elimination of nuclear arms is Japan’s mission The Hidankyo’s appeal has led to designing the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (=TPNW). In 2017 the ICAN (=International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) received the Nobel Peace Prize as the coalition of non-governmental organizations has promoted the UN treaty to be adhered and implemented.
Members of the ICAN recently visited Hiroshima City and held a press meeting November 13, celebrating the Hidankyo for the award and wishing at this opportunity more efforts in adherence and implementation of the UN treaty.
Mr. Kawasaki Akira, a member of the International Steering Group, the ICAN, was present in the meeting. He said; ‘will Japan make solely the survivors over 85 years of age on the average keep talking about elimination and no-use of nuclear weapons? A responsibility to reach the goal lies in the state of Japan. Now the world is on the abyss of danger. Under these circumstances it is Japan that must let the world know inhumanness of nuclear weapons.’ He requested the Japanese government to take initiative to prohibit nuclear weapons.
It is after 50 years from the Japan’s last award of Nobel Peace Prize, when the then-incumbent Prime Minister Sato Eisaku won in 1974. Mr. Sato proclaimed the Three Non-Nuclear Principles in 1967 and then the House of Representatives adopted a parliamentary resolution to obey them. He won the prize as he had pledged no-entry of such weapons into the Japanese territory. However, it has been disclosed later that the former premier had concluded a secret agreement of admission of such weapons with the then-President of the United States Richard Nixon.
Government of Japan is reluctant
Let’s look at today’s Japanese government. Though the United Nations adopted and put into effect the nuclear arms ban treaty, the coalition government of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito remains reluctant, while openly boasting of being covered by the US nuclear umbrella. It even plans to share nuclear weapons in common.
When ex-Premier Sato was incumbent, the government relied on the rule of exclusively defensive posture, avoiding an unmentionable word, ‘alliance’. Today, however, the government does not mind using the once-taboo-word, violating the Constitution and building up infinitely the Self Defense Forces on the premise of staging a war against China with offensive arms. It drives violently so as to double the military expenditure in terms of calculation of the GDP.
The biggest opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party, too, relies on the pivot of US-Japan Alliance. In order to change the current political reality every one of us, citizens, must raise voices, No! Nuclear Weapons.
今年のノーベル平和賞を日本原水爆被害者団体協議会（被団協）が受賞した。原爆の被害を訴え続け、２度と使用してはならない、核兵器は悪であるとの国際的規範を生んだことが評価された。
ノーベル賞委員会が被団協をノーベル平和賞とした理由は、原爆生存者の目撃証言による草の根運動で、核兵器のない世界を実現するたゆまぬ努力によって、核兵器の使用は人道上許されないとの国際規範を作り上げたことによる。
廃絶は日本の責任
被団協の訴えは、核兵器の開発、保有、使用、使用の威嚇など、核兵器に関するあらゆる活動を禁止する国際条約である国連核兵器禁止条約の成立につながり、この条約を推進したＩＣＡＮ＝核兵器廃絶国際キャンペーンは17年、ノーベル平和賞を受賞した。
そのＩＣＡＮのメンバーが11月13日、広島市内で記者会見し、被団協の平和賞受を祝うとともに、これをきっかけに核兵器禁止条約の進展を期待した。
同席したＩＣＡＮの川崎哲国際運営委員は、「核兵器は使ってはいけない、なくさなくてはいけないということを、平均年齢85歳を超えた被爆者にだけ語らせるのか。それを語っていくのは日本という国の責任ではないか。世界が危機的な状況だからこそ日本が核兵器の非人道性を訴える必要がある」と、政府に核兵器禁止の先頭に立つよう訴えた。
日本のノーベル平和賞受賞は１９７４年の佐藤栄作元首相以来、50年ぶり。佐藤氏の受賞は67年に非核三原則を打ち出し、衆議院がこれを遵守するとの国会決議を行ったことで、日本に核兵器を持ち込ませないとしたことが評価された。しかし、佐藤氏は非核三原則の裏で、ニクソン米大統領と核兵器再持ち込みの密約を結んだことが明らかになっている。
背向ける日本政府
現在はどうか。国連で核兵器禁止条約が成立、発効したにもかかわらず、自公政府は背を向けている。米国の核の傘の中にいることを公言し、核兵器の共有すら目論まれている。
佐藤首相当時の自民党政府は専守防衛論であり、「同盟」は禁句だった。現在はその枠はもちろん、憲法すら踏み破り、対中戦争を前提に、自衛隊は先制攻撃兵器も含めて限りなく増強し、軍事予算のＧＤＰの２倍化に向けて暴走中だ。
野党第一党の立憲民主党も「日米同盟基軸」の立場。これを変えるには主権者一人ひとりが自分事として核兵器ノーと声を上げることだ。
英訳版↓
No.1380 Nobel Peace Prize to Hidankyo
The Japan Confederation of A-and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations (=Hidankyo) has received the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize. The confederation has appealed to the rest of the world from Japan the disastrous consequences of nuclear weapons, emphasizing that nuclear bombs would never be used again. Efforts made by the entity was rightfully evaluated: an international norm has been established that nuclear weapons are evil.
LET’S RAISE VOICES TO BUILD WORLD WITHOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS!
The Nobel Prize Committee has honored the Hidankyo as a winner of the Peace Prize because the organization has established an international principle that the use of nuclear arms cannot be allowed from the humanitarian point of view. The Confederation has staged grass-root campaigns with strenuous labors by way of presenting testimonies of survivors-witnesses of the atomic/hydrogen bombs in order to build a world without nuclear weapons.
Elimination of nuclear arms is Japan’s mission
The Hidankyo’s appeal has led to designing the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (=TPNW). In 2017 the ICAN (=International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) received the Nobel Peace Prize as the coalition of non-governmental organizations has promoted the UN treaty to be adhered and implemented.
Members of the ICAN recently visited Hiroshima City and held a press meeting November 13, celebrating the Hidankyo for the award and wishing at this opportunity more efforts in adherence and implementation of the UN treaty.
Mr. Kawasaki Akira, a member of the International Steering Group, the ICAN, was present in the meeting. He said; ‘will Japan make solely the survivors over 85 years of age on the average keep talking about elimination and no-use of nuclear weapons? A responsibility to reach the goal lies in the state of Japan. Now the world is on the abyss of danger. Under these circumstances it is Japan that must let the world know inhumanness of nuclear weapons.’ He requested the Japanese government to take initiative to prohibit nuclear weapons.
It is after 50 years from the Japan’s last award of Nobel Peace Prize, when the then-incumbent Prime Minister Sato Eisaku won in 1974. Mr. Sato proclaimed the Three Non-Nuclear Principles in 1967 and then the House of Representatives adopted a parliamentary resolution to obey them. He won the prize as he had pledged no-entry of such weapons into the Japanese territory. However, it has been disclosed later that the former premier had concluded a secret agreement of admission of such weapons with the then-President of the United States Richard Nixon.
Government of Japan is reluctant
Let’s look at today’s Japanese government. Though the United Nations adopted and put into effect the nuclear arms ban treaty, the coalition government of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito remains reluctant, while openly boasting of being covered by the US nuclear umbrella. It even plans to share nuclear weapons in common.
When ex-Premier Sato was incumbent, the government relied on the rule of exclusively defensive posture, avoiding an unmentionable word, ‘alliance’. Today, however, the government does not mind using the once-taboo-word, violating the Constitution and building up infinitely the Self Defense Forces on the premise of staging a war against China with offensive arms. It drives violently so as to double the military expenditure in terms of calculation of the GDP.
The biggest opposition party, the Constitutional Democratic Party, too, relies on the pivot of US-Japan Alliance. In order to change the current political reality every one of us, citizens, must raise voices, No! Nuclear Weapons.
November 27, 2024