Nuclear Free Future Foundation

Nihon Hidankyo is being honored as a group of survivors of the atomic bombings for their commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons, as the Nobel Committee announced in Oslo. With their eyewitness accounts, the survivors spread the message “that nuclear weapons must never be used again.” In response to the atomic bombings in August 1945, a global movement emerged whose members worked tirelessly to raise awareness of the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of the use of nuclear weapons. Gradually, a powerful international norm emerged that stigmatized the use of nuclear weapons as morally unacceptable. This norm became known as the “nuclear taboo”.

The testimonies of the hibakusha, as the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are also known, are unique in this wider context. These historical witnesses have helped to generate and consolidate widespread opposition to nuclear weapons around the world by drawing on personal stories, creating educational campaigns based on their own experience, and issuing urgent warnings against the spread and use of nuclear weapons. 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.

In awarding this year's Nobel Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee wishes to draw attention to an encouraging fact, as it writes in its prize citation: "No nuclear weapon has been used in war in nearly 80 years. The extraordinary efforts of Nihon Hidankyo and other representatives of the Hibakusha have contributed greatly to the establishment of the nuclear taboo. It is therefore alarming that today this taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure."

The nuclear powers are modernising and upgrading their arsenals; new countries appear to be preparing to acquire nuclear weapons; and threats are being made to use nuclear weapons in ongoing warfare. At this moment in human history, it is worth reminding ourselves what nuclear weapons are: the most destructive weapons the world has ever seen.

Next year will mark 80 years since two American atomic bombs killed an estimated 120 000 inhabitants of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A comparable number died of burn and radiation injuries in the months and years that followed. Today’s nuclear weapons have far greater destructive power. They can kill millions and would impact the climate catastrophically. A nuclear war could destroy our civilisation.

The fates of those who survived the infernos of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were long concealed and neglected. In 1956, local Hibakusha associations along with victims of nuclear weapons tests in the Pacific formed the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organisations. This name was shortened in Japanese to Nihon Hidankyo. It would become the largest and most influential Hibakusha organisation in Japan.