Nobel Committee Chair calls on young people to carry on legacy of peace
Nihon Hidankyo, the Japan Confederation of A- and H- Bomb Sufferers Organizations, represents the survivors of the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They are known as hibakusha.
Norway's Joergen Frydnes attended an event on nuclear disarmament at Tokyo's Sophia University on Sunday. He appeared at a news conference with Nihon Hidankyo co-chair Tanaka Terumi.
Frydnes said his trip marked the first time ever for the Nobel Committee to travel to the home country of a Peace Prize laureate.
He said, "This is a unique opportunity to us, and it's a unique time because we are here to listen and to learn, and we believe the world should listen and learn to the voices of the hibakusha."
Frydnes said Nihon Hidankyo members "have been instrumental in turning memory, turning pain and suffering into a force for change into a force for peace."
He added that ever since the committee announced Nihon Hidankyo's award in October last year, they have seen "social movements, anti-nuclear movements, and civil society and private individuals from all over the world who are re-engaged in the issue of nuclear disarmament."
Frydnes said that he believes the 80th anniversary of the attacks in August could be an opportunity for a turning point on the issue.
In a speech he gave after the news conference, Frydnes said that many analysts now warn the world is standing on the edge of a "new and more unstable nuclear age."
He said the survivors and their supporters "helped the world see with clear eyes what nuclear weapons really mean." He called them "the light the world needs."
Frydnes addressed the young people in the room, telling them that they are "the future custodians of this memory" and "the new stewards of this truth."
He urged them: "Take up the torch. Do not let silence grow. Tell the stories. Study the history. Resist the forgetting. Raise your voice."
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