Bomb survivors use Nobel Peace Prize 2024 win to share their anti-nuke message with younger generations

Nihon Hidankyo, Nobel Peace Prize 2024 winner, strive to pass on anti-nuclear message to younger generations

The recipient of this year's Nobel Peace Prize is a fast-dwindling group of atomic bomb survivors who are facing down the shrinking time they have left to convey the firsthand horror they witnessed 79 years ago.

Nihon Hidankyo, the Japanese organization of survivors of the U.S. atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was awarded for its decadeslong activism against nuclear weapons. The survivors, known as hibakusha, see the prize and the international attention as their last chance to get their message out to younger generations.

“We must seriously think about the succession of our messages. We must thoroughly hand over from our generation to the future generations,” Toshiyuki Mimaki, senior member of the Hiroshima branch of Hidankyo, told reporters on Friday (October 11, 2024) night.

“With the honor of the Nobel Peace Prize, we now have a responsibility to get our messages handed down not only in Japan but also across the world.”

The honor rewards members' grassroots efforts to keep telling their stories — even though that involved recollecting horrendous ordeals during and after the bombings, and facing discrimination and worries about their health from the lasting radiation impact — for the sole purpose of never again let that happen.

Now, with their average age at 85.6, the hibakusha are increasingly frustrated that their fear of a growing nuclear threat and push to eliminate nuclear weapons are not fully understood by younger generations.

The number of prefectural hibakusha groups decreased from 47 to 36. And the Japanese government, under the U.S. nuclear umbrella for protection, has refused to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapon.