Hiroshima Mayor Praises Draft Nuke Ban Treaty for Citing Hibakusha

Hiroshima, May 24 (Jiji Press)--Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui has praised a draft U.N. nuclear weapons ban treaty for using the word "hibakusha" to refer to people who survived the 1945 U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. In its preamble, the draft says that the nations proposing the Convention on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons are "mindful of the suffering of the victims of the use of nuclear weapons (Hibakusha) as well as of those affected by the testing of nuclear weapons." Noting that the draft uses hibakusha instead of the English word survivor, Matsui said, "This gives more meaning than merely translating the Japanese word into English." Hiroshima, western Japan, and the southwestern city of Nagasaki were devastated by U.S. atomic bombs on Aug. 6 and 9, 1945, respectively, in the closing days of World War II. Matsui also rated the draft highly for "including comprehensive content taking advantage of the current regime under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and for sufficiently taking past discussions into consideration." "I hope that international negotiations will make progress for the conclusion of an effective treaty," he said. END