Japan Press Weekly

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2024 April 24 - May 7 [PEACE]

2024 National Peace March starts for Hiroshima

The 2024 National Peace March against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs began on May 6 and will travel through all 47 prefectures on eight separate courses. The main course, from Tokyo to Hiroshima, is scheduled to arrive at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park on August 4.

A departing rally for the Tokyo-Hiroshima course took place at Yumenoshima Park with participation of about 300 people, including A-bomb survivors (Hibakusha).

On behalf of organizers, Takakusaki Hiroshi of the Organizing Committee of the World Conference against A and H Bombs delivered a speech in greeting. He said, “Many Japanese people want Japan, an A-bombed nation with the war-renouncing Constitution, to choose to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) in a situation where the killing continues in Ukraine and in Israel’s war on Gaza.” He called for “extending every possible solidarity to realize Japan’s participation in the TPNW.”

Tsuchida Yayoi, vice secretary-general of the Japan Council against A and H Bombs (Japan Gensuikyo), reported that the U.S. “Peace Walk 2024” is going to walk about 600 miles, about the same as the distance between Tokyo and Hiroshima, over a period of two months starting on May 7, and introduced warm words of encouragement sent from sister marchers in the Peace Walk 2024. She said that this is important for the citizens of both Japan and the U.S. to stand in solidarity for peace when U.S. President Joe Biden and Japan’s Kishida Administration are seeking a major military buildup.

Omura Mie from Aichi Prefecture who will walk the Tokyo-Hiroshima route said that her husband’s father had entered Nagasaki City after the bombing and been exposed to radiation from the bomb. She expressed her determination to walk to the finish line, saying, “I will take on this peace walk for my father-in-law and my husband, who is a second-generation Hibakusha.”