All municipal assemblies in Nagasaki Pref. have adopted resolution calling for treaty banning nuclear weapons

   The Sasebo City Assembly on July 11 unanimously adopted a resolution calling for the early conclusion of a treaty totally banning and abolishing nuclear weapons.

   With this adoption, all 23 municipal assemblies in Nagasaki Prefecture have adopted similar resolutions, according to the Nagasaki Prefectural Association for a Non-Nuclear Government that has petitioned local assemblies to do so.

   The Sasebo City Assembly resolution calls on the government of Japan, the only atom-bombed nation, to make special efforts to get an international convention totally banning the use, testing, production, and deployment of nuclear weapons concluded as soon as possible.

   The Japanese government position on nuclear weapons has come to light through then Defense Minister Kyuma Fumio’s recent remark that the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki “couldn’t be helped” as well as Japan’s abstentions in the U.N. General Assembly from voting on resolutions prohibiting the use of nuclear weapons.

   Sasebo’s resolution shows how the government is alienated from the residents in the atom-bombed prefecture.

   Sasebo City Assembly Chair Matsuo Hiroyuki later in the day said, “All assembly members’ groups have come to agree that we need to call on the world to work for the abolition of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons must be abolished.”

   Kawaguchi Tatsuya, secretary general of the Nagasaki Prefectural Association for a Non-Nuclear Government, said, “The government of the only atom-bombed nation must actively work for the elimination of nuclear weapons.”                                     - Akahata, July 12, 2007