The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded Friday to Nihon Hidankyo, a Japanese organization of survivors of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, for its activism against nuclear weapons.
Jørgen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, said the award was made as the “taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure.”
Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a shift in his country’s nuclear doctrine, in a move aimed at discouraging the West from allowing Ukraine to strike Russia with longer-range weapons. It appeared to significantly lower the threshold for the possible use of Russia’s nuclear arsenal.
Watne Frydnes said the Nobel committee “wishes to honor all survivors who, despite physical suffering and painful memories, have chosen to use their costly experience to cultivate hope and engagement for peace.”
Hidankyo’s Hiroshima branch chairperson, Toshiyuki Mimaki, who was standing by at the city hall for the announcement, cheered and teared up when he received the news.
“Is it really true? Unbelievable!” Mimaki screamed.
Efforts to eradicate nuclear weapons have been honored before by the Nobel committee. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) won the peace prize in 2017, and in 1995 Joseph Rotblat and the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs won for “their efforts to diminish the part played by nuclear arms in international politics and, in the longer run, to eliminate such arms.”
Beatrice Fihn, who was the executive director of ICAN when it won the Nobel, said honoring Nihon Hidankyo was “quite emotional.”
“We are partners in this fight,” she told The Associated Press.
The survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki “know nuclear weapons the best. … They know how it feels like, how it looks like, how it smells when your city is burning from nuclear weapons use,” she said.
This year’s prize was awarded against a backdrop of devastating conflicts raging in the Middle East, Ukraine and Sudan.
“It is very clear that threats of using nuclear weapons are putting pressure on the important international norm, the taboo of using nuclear weapons,” Watne Frydnes said in response to a question on whether the rhetoric from Russia surrounding nuclear weapons in its invasion of Ukraine had influenced this year’s decision.
“And therefore it is alarming to see how threats of use is also damaging this norm. To uphold an international strong taboo against the use is crucial for all of humanity,” he added.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on X that “the spectre of Hiroshima and Nagasaki still looms over humanity. This makes the advocacy of Nihon Hidankyo invaluable. This Nobel Peace Prize sends a powerful message. We have the duty to remember. And an even greater duty to protect the next generations from the horrors of nuclear war.”
The United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, killing 70,000 people, three days after its bombing of Hiroshima killed 140,000. Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, 1945, ending World War II and its nearly half-century of aggression across Asia.
