The Japanese grass roots group Nihon Hidankyo, comprised of survivors of Second World War atomic bombings, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo on Friday.
The committee said the award given to the group, also known as Hibakusha after the Japanese word referring to survivors of the bombing of the Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was timely given what it said were “alarming” and increasing threats to wield nuclear power in war.
“Hibakusha is receiving the Peace Prize for its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again,” the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in its citation.
The world’s first atomic bomb destroyed Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, killing an estimated 140,000 people between the initial blast and the following months. Three days later, the U.S. forces dropped a second nuclear bomb, on Nagasaki, killing another 70,000 people, according to estimates. Japan surrendered on Aug. 15.
‘I can’t believe it’s real’: group’s co-chair
“I can’t believe it’s real,” Nihon Hidankyo co-chair Toshiyuki Mimaki told a press conference in Hiroshima, as he held back tears and pinched his cheek.
Mimaki, a survivor himself, said the award would give a major boost to the group’s efforts to demonstrate that the abolition of nuclear weapons was possible.
“[The win] will be a great force to appeal to the world that the abolition of nuclear weapons and everlasting peace can be achieved,” he said. “Nuclear weapons should absolutely be abolished.”
Witnesses to the only two nuclear bombs ever to be used in conflict have dedicated their lives to the struggle for a nuclear-free world, with the group founded in 1956.
“The Hibakusha help us to describe the indescribable, to think the unthinkable, and to somehow grasp the incomprehensible pain and suffering caused by nuclear weapons,” the committee said.
Nihon Hidankyo head Toshiyuki Mimaki told a news conference in Hiroshima that the prize as an encouraging sign for the disarmament movement.
“It would be a great force to appeal to the world that the abolition of nuclear weapons can be achieved,” he said.
“Nuclear weapons should absolutely be abolished.”
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said the honour was “extremely meaningful” for the country, in comments made while at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit (ASEAN) summit in Laos.
Several organizations have received prize recently
Without naming specific countries, Joergen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, warned that nuclear nations should not contemplate using their weapons.
“It is therefore alarming that today this taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure,” he said.
In 2011, Hidankyo’s members were forced to reckon not just with the past dangers of nuclear weapons but also the current risks related to nuclear energy when a tsunami triggered a meltdown at the Fukushima Daichi nuclear reactor, exposing thousands to radiation.
At the group’s subsequent assembly, most said that Hidankyo should call for a phasing out of nuclear power, according to an Associated Press report at the time, but others spoke of the key role nuclear energy held for Japan’s economy.
When it comes to the Peace Prize, groups and organizations have been honoured by the Nobel Committee with increasing frequency in the past 20 years, including the International Atomic Energy Agency (2005), the European Union (2012), the World Food Programme (2020) and Russia’s Memorial and Ukraine’s Centre for Civil Liberties, joint winners along with Belarussian human rights activist Ales Bialiatski in 2022.
The Nobel Committee has regularly put focus on the issue of nuclear weapons, most recently with its award to ICAN, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, which received the award in 2017.
Ceremony to be held Dec. 10
Past individual winners of the Peace Prize have included Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Malala Yousafzai. Last year’s the award went to Narges Mohammadi, the imprisoned activist who has campaigned for women’s rights and the abolition of the death penalty in Iran.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee is comprised of five individuals and makes its decisions based on nominations that must be submitted by Jan. 31.
The committee seeks a consensus on its selection. If there is none, the decision is reached by majority vote.
British Canadian scientist Geoffrey Hinton, known as the godfather of AI, was announced as the winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics, along with American John Hopfield. The duo are being honoured for discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning within artificial neural networks.
Thousands of people can propose names: members of governments and parliaments; current heads of state; university professors of history, social sciences, law and philosophy; and former Nobel Peace Prize laureates, among others. This year, there are 286 nominees, although the full list will be locked in a vault for 50 years.
The Nobel prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1.45 million Cdn).
The Nobel prizes are presented to the laureates on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death, in Oslo.
