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2015 February 25 - March 3 TOP3 [PEACE]

Bikini Day rally participants call for ban on nuclear weapons in 70th year following US atomic bombings

The Japan Council against A and H Bombs (Japan Gensuikyo) on February 28 held a rally to commemorate the tragedy caused by the U.S. hydrogen bomb test at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands (March 1, 1954), seeking to take a decisive step forward toward a world free from nuclear weapons in the 70th year commemoration of the atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

More than 1,100 people from across Japan took part in the rally held in Shizuoka’s Yaizu City. People planning to join the Gensuikyo delegation to the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) Review Conference starting on April 27 appeared on the stage. They expressed their determination to vigorously campaign for a nuclear-free world during their visit to New York.

Gensuikyo Secretary General Yasui Masakazu in his speech said that the New York action is just around the corner and encouraged the participants to increase their efforts to collect signatures on a petition calling for the total ban on nuclear weapons.

On the following day, around 1,600 people marched in demonstration from Yaizu Station to the grave of Kuboyama Aikichi, a crew member of the Lucky Dragon No. 5, who died as a result of exposure to radioactive fallout after the 1954 U.S. nuclear test.

A 31-year-old participant, who walked at the front of the group holding a picture of Kuboyama, said, “The use of nuclear weapons will cause irreparable and horrifying damage and death. In accordance with Kuboyama’s dying statement, ‘I hope I will be the last one to be killed by nuclear bombs,’ we will continue to work for the abolition of nuclear weapons.”


Past related articles
> Bikini Day events mark 60th anniversary of US H-bomb test [March 1&2, 2014]