Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Japanese atomic bomb survivors' group Nihon Hidankyo

Nuclear weapons never bring peace, says activist Toshiyuki Mimaki, as he urges Russia and Israel to exercise restraint

A Japanese child sits crying in the rubble of Hiroshima a year after the city was devastated by the world's first atomic bomb attack by the US, on August 6, 1945. Bettmann

The situation for children in Gaza is similar to that of Japan at the end of the Second World War, said the co-chairman of Nihon Hidankyo, a group of atom bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki that won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday.

“In Gaza, bleeding children are being held [by their parents]. It's like in Japan 80 years ago,” Toshiyuki Mimaki told a news conference in Tokyo on Friday. "[Children in Hiroshima and Nagasaki] lost their fathers in the war and mothers in the atom bomb. They became orphans.”

Nuclear weapons never bring peace, he said. “It has been said that because of nuclear weapons, the world maintains peace. But nuclear weapons can be used by terrorists,” he said.

“For example, if Russia uses them against Ukraine, Israel against Gaza, it won't end there. Politicians should know these things,” added Mr Mimaki, who was playing outside his family's home in Hiroshima, aged three, when the bomb was dropped on August 6, 1945, destroying the city and killing 140,000 people.

A second bomb was dropped three days later on Nagasaki, which killed 70,000 more. Japan surrendered on August 15, 1945, ending the Second World War.

Survivors of the attacks were left with many health problems, including an increase in cases of leukaemia, which was first noticed about two years after the attacks, peaking about four to six years later. Children were the worst affected.

The grass roots movement of survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki received the award for its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again. "Never did I dream this could happen," Mr Mimaki said on Friday, with tears in his eyes, after his group won the prize.

It has provided thousands of witness accounts, issued resolutions and public appeals, and sent annual delegations to the UN and peace conferences to remind the world of the pressing need for nuclear disarmament.

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said the award was “extremely meaningful”. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen also praised the selection, saying the award sent a “powerful message”.

The award represents “an indirect critique” of the nuclear threats made by Russian President Vladimir Putin and his regime, as well as that of Iran, said Asle Sveen, a researcher who retired from the Norwegian Nobel Institute.

“This year's prize is a prize that focuses on the necessity of upholding this nuclear taboo. And we have all a responsibility, particularly the nuclear powers,” Jorgen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, told a press conference in Oslo where he announced the winner.

Without naming specific countries, Mr Frydnes warned that nuclear nations should not contemplate using the weapons. “Today's nuclear weapons have far greater destructive power. They can kill millions and would impact the climate catastrophically,” he said. “A nuclear war could destroy our civilisation.”

Efforts to eradicate nuclear weapons have been honoured in the past by the Nobel committee. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons 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.”

Who are Nihon Hidankyo?

The fates of those who survived the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were long concealed and neglected, especially in the initial years after the end of the war. Local Hibakusha associations, along with victims of nuclear weapons tests in the Pacific, formed the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organisations in 1956.

The organisation, whose name was shortened in Japanese to Nihon Hidankyo, would become the largest and most influential Hibakusha organisation in Japan. It has helped drive global opposition to nuclear weapons through the force of the survivors' testimonies while also creating educational campaigns and issuing stark warnings about the spread and use of nuclear arms.

With each passing year, the number of survivors from the two nuclear blasts in Japan nearly 80 years ago grows smaller. But the grassroots movement has played a part creating a culture of remembrance, allowing for new generations of Japanese to carry on the work.

Nobel Peace Prize winners – in pictures