George Nishiyama / Reuters – 2005-08-07 08:55:51

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2005-08-05T231947Z_01_MCC583967_RTRUKOC_0_JAPAN-HIROSHIMA.xml

HIROSHIMA, Japan (Aug 6, 2005) — Tens of thousands of people from around the world gathered in Hiroshima on Saturday to mark the 60th anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city and to renew calls for the abolition of nuclear arms…

Under a blazing summer sun, survivors and families of victims assembled at the Peace Memorial Park near “ground zero”, the spot where the bomb detonated on the morning of August 6, 1945, killing thousands and levelling the city… At 8:15 a.m., the time when the U.S. B-29 warplane Enola Gay dropped the bomb, people at the park and throughout the city observed a minute’s silence in memory of those who perished.

Bells at temples and churches rang and passengers on the streetcars that run throughout the city bowed their heads in remembrance of the dead, including those incinerated by the bomb 60 years ago while riding the streetcars…

“This August 6 … is a time of inheritance, of awakening, and of commitment, in which we inherit the commitment of the bomb victims to the abolition of nuclear weapons and realisation of genuine world peace,” Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba told the gathering.

Akiba said in his Peace Declaration that the five established nuclear powers — the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China — as well as India, Pakistan and North Korea were “jeopardising human survival”.

Referring to moves to revise the pacifist constitution that Japan adopted after the war, Akiba said it was an obligation of the present generation to uphold the principle “thou shalt not kill”.

“The Japanese constitution, which embodies this axiom forever as the sovereign will of a nation, should be a guiding light for the world in the 21st century,” he said….

Posted in accordance with Title 17, US Code, for noncommercial, educational purposes.