The Russian invasion of Ukraine, coupled with the much-derided Group of Seven summit in May, cast a long shadow over an international symposium on the abolition of nuclear weapons held in Hiroshima on July 29.

The International Symposium for Peace, “The Road to Nuclear Weapons Abolition: For Hiroshima and Nagasaki to serve as ‘the check’ on nuclear war,” was jointly sponsored by The Asahi Shimbun, the Hiroshima city government and the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation.

Elayne Whyte, a professor of practice at John Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, delivered the keynote address. She previously served as Costa Rica’s ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva and chaired the 2017 negotiations that led to the U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

Referring to widespread pessimism over the global security situation since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, Whyte said there was still a glimmer of hope for building a new security paradigm by “reframing the problems, by seeking new solutions and approaches, by educating the public about the reality of nuclear weapons and by learning from history and extracting lessons from history.”

As examples of past breakthroughs, she cited the reconciliation of wartime enemies France and Germany that eventually led to the formation of the European Union as well as the efforts in the late 1980s by U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev to reduce their respective nuclear arsenals.

Whyte also called for greater efforts to educate the citizens of nuclear states about the horrors of nuclear weapons, saying safety cannot be guaranteed by having nuclear stockpiles.

She said the “indomitable spirt of the hibakusha” would serve as inspiration for the difficult path forward given how they “endured immense suffering and hardship but emerged as strong advocates for peace and change.”

PANEL DISCUSSION

The subsequent panel discussion focused first on the G-7 summit held in Hiroshima in May.

The panel participants were asked to rank the summit’s achievements on nuclear disarmament with a score out of a possible 100.

Tomoko Watanabe, executive director of the nongovernmental organization Asian Network of Trust (ANT)-Hiroshima, gave the summit a score of minus 20 and 30.

She said the minus 20 was directed at the Hiroshima Vision on Nuclear Disarmament that the leaders released, which did not contain a single reference to hibakusha, the survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“I was angry and deeply disappointed,” Watanabe said. “If that is the case, why did they have to use Hiroshima in the title of the document?”

The 30 score was for a working group of nongovernmental groups set up on the sidelines of the G-7 summit to discuss nuclear disarmament and which compiled a policy recommendation document, Watanabe said.

Kang Jung-min, former chairman of South Korea’s Nuclear Safety and Security Commission, gave a score of between 30 to 40, which he said would translate to a B or C letter grade.

While he praised the G-7 document for emphasizing the importance of maintaining the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and nuclear test ban treaty, he said, “The wording about nuclear deterrence clearly contradicted the calls for maintaining the other treaties.”

Kang criticized the Japanese government for opposing calls for the United States to declare no first-use of nuclear weapons. He also took issue with the planned start of reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel at a facility in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, next year. He asserted that reprocessing would lead to the extraction of plutonium that could be used in nuclear weapons.

Giving a more positive assessment of the G-7 summit was Ken Endo, a professor of political science at the University of Tokyo who specializes in international politics. He gave it a 70 score.

“The message of the summit to not allow any invasion such as Russia’s of Ukraine was a positive result of the forum,” Endo said. “Having the president of Ukraine, which is the target of the Russian threat to use nuclear weapons, here with the G-7 leaders to declare they will not allow such threats cannot be called meaningless.”

Whyte refrained from giving a score to the G-7 summit because of her position as a former ambassador.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has moved the debate away from nuclear disarmament toward how to thwart the possible use of nuclear weapons.

Watanabe said there was a need to transmit the reality of the devastation nuclear weapons cause to create a paradigm shift regarding nuclear deterrence.

Kang said some people in South Korea are clamoring for his country to possess nuclear weapons on grounds Ukraine was invaded in part because it disavowed nuclear weapons on its soil after gaining independence following the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But he said there was a need to compare which was a more secure situation, the one before a nation had nuclear weapons or after the nation possessed nuclear weapons to deter attacks by hostile forces. Kang said having nuclear weapons left open the possibility of accidental use.

Whyte said the Russian invasion would have a negative effect on the NPT because a nuclear power is threatening a non-nuclear one with the use of nuclear weapons. She said no non-nuclear state would have ever signed the NPT if it knew there was the possibility a nuclear power might threaten them in the future.

But Whyte added that the increased urgency surrounding the possible use of nuclear weapons gives more momentum to non-nuclear states seeking to work toward nuclear disarmament.

ASSESSING THE G-7 SUMMIT

The afternoon session kicked off with a blistering assessment of the G-7 Hiroshima summit by writer Kaoru Takamura.

She said the summit showed “how difficult and delicate” the existence Hiroshima remains for the leaders of the world, “especially those of the nuclear powers.”

Takamura added that while Prime Minister Fumio Kishida deserves praise for bringing the world leaders to Hiroshima, he paid the price of having those same figureheads engage in political posturing. While he must have derived self-satisfaction from pulling off the summit, she noted that it did not end with any positive or specific results on the issue of nuclear disarmament.

Takamura explained that while the 1945 atomic bombings gave the Japanese an entirely different perspective about such weapons in comparison to the rest of the world, “Hiroshima and Nagasaki are increasingly becoming abstract, even to the Japanese public who do not directly know about the experiences of the hibakusha.”

She also asserted that ordinary Japanese generally don’t realize they are protected by the U.S. nuclear umbrella.

“The Japanese public is being pulled in two totally different directions, one calling for nuclear disarmament with the other supporting the security treaty with the United States that places Japan under its nuclear umbrella.”

Mankind no longer had the luxury of spending years or decades discussing how to lower the risk of nuclear weapons, given that no one had any idea what Russian President Vladimir Putin might be thinking about using the Russian nuclear arsenal, Takamura added.

She suggested taking small steps, such as working for an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine to remove the risk of the use of nuclear weapons, as well as designating nations that have signed the TPNW as nuclear-free zones.

The next larger step would be for Japan to think about how it can extricate itself from the U.S. nuclear umbrella.

PASSING ON THE HIBAKUSHA EXPERIENCE

Two individuals then spoke about passing on the experiences of hibakusha.

Hiroko Kishida, who was 6 years old when the atomic bomb leveled Hiroshima, has spoken about her experiences to young people, while the soprano Kikuko Teshima has worked to convey the stories of hibakusha.

For many years, Kishida told no one about her experiences.

But she now speaks to elementary and junior high school students visiting Hiroshima. She noted that they had greater interest in the atomic bombings because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Although not a hibakusha herself, Teshima has taken on the responsibility of passing on Kishida’s experiences to the public.

She returned to Japan after a long musical career in Europe and signed up to convey the experiences of hibakusha after reading reports about the dwindling number of hibakusha and the declining number of those who can speak about their own experience.

Teshima is part of a group who have learned about the experiences of hibakusha by listening to what Kishida endured all those decades ago.

She has also begun another program sponsored by the Hiroshima city government to have family members pass on the experiences of hibakusha. Teshima’s aunt is now the only surviving family member who lived through the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as her other elderly relatives have passed on.

Teshima said she has come to realize how difficult it is for hibakusha to speak about their experiences, even to family members. Her aunt occasionally told her that she developed headaches while speaking with her when summoning up her recollections of the past.

The morning and afternoon sessions have been archived and can be viewed for free until Aug. 31 at: https://youtube.com/live/1Ed9p9f27i4?feature=share (morning session) and https://youtube.com/live/xCglFT0cv04?feature=share (afternoon session).