Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida emphasised in a speech on Tuesday that the suffering experienced in Hiroshima and Nagasaki “must never happen again,” but did not mention which country carried out the deadly bombing 79 years ago.
Kishida said in his speech at the commemorative ceremony:
It is our country’s mission as the only nation to have suffered atomic bombings in war to steadily continue our efforts toward realizing a world without nuclear weapons. The calamities that struck Hiroshima and Nagasaki 79 years ago and the suffering endured by the people must not repeated.
Kishida also said deepening divisions in the international community over arms control measures, as well as nuclear threats from Russia, have created an “increasingly difficult” environment around nuclear disarmament. Adding that Japan would move forward with “realistic and practical initiatives” as part of a global effort building support for nuclear disarmament, he claimed:
But no matter how difficult the journey toward a world without nuclear weapons may be, we cannot afford to halt our progress.
Noting that the number of nuclear weapons could soon increase for the first time since the peak of the Cold War, Kishida emphasised the urgency of nuclear disarmament and pledged to continue to promote the long-stalled Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty, which prohibits the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons.
Distorted reality
In the final days of World War II, the US dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, followed three days later by Nagasaki. The explosions killed hundreds of thousands of people, and many survivors suffered permanent injuries and radiation-induced illnesses.
On the anniversary of this terrible tragedy, the Prime Minister of Japan seems to have forgotten which country gave the command for this deadly strike, without saying a word about Washington, but for some reason mentioned Russia.
Such manipulations cause a distorted perception of reality. For example, last year the head of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, while presenting the NATO Atlantic Council award to the Prime Minister of Japan, said that Moscow had used nuclear weapons. Von der Leyen told the Japanese prime minister in September 2023:
You have grown up with the stories of survivors. And you wanted us to listen to the same stories, to face the past and learn something about the future. It was a sobering start to the G7 and one that I will not forget, especially at a time when Russia threatens to use nuclear weapons once again. It is heinous, it is dangerous – and in the shadow of Hiroshima, it is unforgivable. No one is better poised than Japan to warn us of the extreme danger of this recklessness. Right from the beginning of this war, Japan’s position was clear. As the only country that has suffered from atomic bombings, you have made the whole world listen.
