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Attendance at the 9th Executive Conference of Mayors for Peace and Opening Ceremony of A-Bomb Exhibition
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In November 2015, Mayors for Peace (President: Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui) held the 9th Executive Conference of Mayors for Peace in Ypres, Belgium, one of the Mayors for Peace Vice-President cities.
Mayor Matsui took the opportunity of being in Europe to also attend the opening ceremony of an A-bomb exhibition at the United Nations Office at Vienna, and also visited Manchester and London in the United Kingdom to attend related events and hold discussions with the mayors and others.
Mayor Matsui's main engagements
November 11
Prior to the Executive Conference, Mayor Matsui met with the Deputy Mayor of Ypres Mr. Jef Verschoore.
He presented Deputy Mayor Verschoore with an explanatory plaque for a sapling of the gingko tree that survived the atomic bombing, which were donated to Ypres in 2012, and said that he would like the people of the city to share Hiroshima's desire for peace.
November 12 and 13
The 9th Mayors for Peace Executive Conference was held, attended by 11 executive cities.
Participants discussed future initiatives.
On the first day, attendees discussed the 2020 Vision, the action guidelines to demand the abolishment of nuclear weapons by 2020.
One of the objectives listed in the 2020 Vision is the conclusion of a nuclear weapons convention by 2015.
The term 'by 2015' was deleted, and the
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9th Executive Conference of Mayors for Peace
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the decision was made to continue to pursue this objective.
Additionally, the following items (and others) were decided as the subject of concentrated efforts moving forward:
(1) activities to educate people on the humanitarian impact and risk of nuclear weapons
(2) requests to policymakers in each nation to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki
(3) the increase of Mayors for Peace member cities to 10,000 cities by 2020
(4) pass on the facts of the damage from the bombing through youth exchange activities
(5) invite interns to the Hiroshima Secretariat.
In addition to activities aiming for the
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abolition of nuclear weapons, it was also decided to address urgent issues such as poverty, refugees and climate change, in line with the regulations in Article 3 of the Mayors for Peace Covenant.
It was confirmed that the next General Session will be held in 2017 in Nagasaki, and the session after that will be brought forward by one year to be held in 2020 in Hiroshima.
The Executive Conference closed on the second day with the adoption of a Resolution that included a call for all governments to participate in the United Nations Open-Ended Working Group.
Following on from the Executive Conference, the General Meeting of the 2020 Vision Campaign Association was held.
The secretariat for the Association was set up in Ypres City in November 2007, and since then, Ypres had promoted the global roll-out of the campaign.
However, with the move to establish regional groups centered around the leader cities in each region of the world, it was decided to move the Association's secretariat to Hiroshima.
November 14
Mayor Matsui visited Manchester City, which is implementing proactive activities as a Mayors for Peace member city.
He presented Mayor Paul Murphy with a Leader City Certificate, and asked him to implement even stronger initiatives in the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Following this, Mayor Matsui attended a commemorative event for Project G that is being implemented by Manchester.
In this project, a contest among elementary schools on art and poetry on the topic of peace is held, with the top schools awarded gingko tree seedlings from the Hiroshima tree that survived the atomic bombing so that they can grow the tree themselves.
The aim of the project is to develop an awareness of peace among the young generation.
November 16
In a conference room at the House of Lords in the Palace of Westminster, the Mayor made a presentation on the state of Hiroshima before and after the atomic bombing, the path to recovery, and the activities of the Mayors for Peace, in front of an audience of around 50 people, including members of both houses of parliament and mayors from Mayors for Peace member cities in the United Kingdom.
There was an active discussion after the presentation.
The Mayor then visited Mr. Edward Lister, Deputy Mayor of London, explained the Mayors for Peace activities, and stated that he would like to work together to think about how to achieve a peaceful world that is not dependent on nuclear weapons, through dialogue with the people of the United Kingdom, which is a nuclear weapon state.
Deputy Mayor Lister said that London would cooperate in the Mayors for Peace activities.
A terrorist attack occurred on November 13, 2015, in Paris, and in light of this, a statement signed by the 26 Mayors for Peace executive cities was sent to all member cities, together with a request to widely publicize the statement to national governments and the public in the respective countries.
November 17
Mayor Matsui visited Mr. Franz Prokop, the District Director of the 16th District of the city of Vienna.
He was welcomed by the Mr. Prokop and a residents' exchange group in front of a peace monument that had been built using stones that survived the atomic bombing, donated by the City of Hiroshima.
Next, the Mayor had a meeting with Mr. Sebastian Kurz, Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs.
He expressed his gratitude for Austria taking the lead in debate focused on the inhumanity of nuclear weapons, including the Humanitarian Pledge.
Mr. Kurz promised that the Austrian government would continue to work to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons.
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Mayor Matsui then attended the opening ceremony for an A-bomb exhibition being held at the United Nations Office in Vienna.
This exhibition follows on from exhibitions held at the United Nations Headquarters in New York and Europe.
The venue was filled with over 100 visitors and media, indicating the high level of interest in the exhibition.
In his speech, Mayor Matsui said that he would like many national governments and leaders of international bodies to see the displays, and appealed for them to make the utmost effort to eliminate nuclear weapons, the ultimate evil, from the earth.
Future activities of Mayors for Peace
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Mayor Matsui making a speech at the A-bomb exhibition opening ceremony
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Through the discussions and the debate at the Executive Conference this time, we could confirm that moves to form regional groups based on initiatives by leader cities are making definite progress, and see that further moves to revitalize the activities in the future are taking shape.
We will forge even closer ties with leader cities, and make the most of the Mayors for Peace network, to implement activities to accelerate moves towards the conclusion of the nuclear weapons convention, as well as proactively implementing initiatives to spread and communicate the truth of the atomic bombing and the message of the hibakusha.
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| (Peace and International Solidarity Promotion Division) |
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