One year after Nihon Hidankyo's Nobel Peace Prize win, atomic bomb survivors in Hiroshima continue signature campaigns urging Japan to join the nuclear ban treaty. With the average age of hibakusha exceeding 86, support for abolition groups is growing, but hopes now rest on the youth.
It has been one year since Nihon Hidankyo, the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations, received the Nobel Peace Prize in October 2024. In Hiroshima, hibakusha continue their efforts toward nuclear abolition. In late September, amid lingering summer heat in Hiroshima's Peace Memorial Park, atomic bomb survivors collected signatures once again.
Members of seven survivors' organizations have taken to the streets every two months for the past four years, urging the Japanese government to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. "We've long called for there never to be any hibakusha produced again, and that has given rise to a global taboo against using nuclear weapons," said Kunihiko Sakuma, 80, chair of a Hiroshima prefectural hibakusha association. "But now, we're at the brink of nuclear weapons possibly being used again."
The average age of hibakusha has exceeded 86, highlighting the aging survivor population, yet support for nuclear-weapons abolitionist groups is increasing. Hidankyo's work stems from the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, advocating globally for nuclear disarmament. Nearly 80 years after the bombings, the survivors' voices are increasingly pinned on passing the torch to younger generations.