A-Bomb Dome Is Lesson of History: Former Hiroshima Mayor

Hiroshima, Aug. 5 (Jiji Press)--The Atomic Bomb Dome in the western Japan city of Hiroshima is a witness to the horrors of nuclear weapons that will teach future generations about the atrocities of war, former Mayor Takashi Hiraoka said. Hiraoka, 93, played a key role in efforts that led to the listing of the structure as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1996. "The dome is a lesson of human history," Hiraoka said. "I want the dome to provide an opportunity for children who don't know about war to think about the history of war and the horrors of atomic bombs," he said. The building, which was then called the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, stood about 160 meters to the northeast of the epicenter of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, in the closing days of World War II. The bomb blew off and burned the roof of the building, killing all inside immediately. In the immediate aftermath of the war, some Hiroshima residents called for the dome to be torn down, saying that it would conjure up bad memories. However, the public turned in favor of preserving the building thanks to a passage in a diary kept by Hiroko Kajiyama, who survived the bombing at the age of 1 and died of acute leukemia at the age of 16. In the diary, Kajiyama wrote that the dome was the only thing that would show to the world the horrors of the atomic bomb. A campaign to collect signatures for the addition of the Atomic Bomb Dome to the World Heritage list began in 1993, just a year after Japan joined the World Heritage Convention. It collected some 1.65 million signatures in a short period. World Heritage sites have to be protected by domestic law. Under Japanese law at the time, however, the dome was not old enough to be protected as historic cultural properties. Some in the Cultural Affairs Agency were not supportive of the push to list the Atomic Bomb Dome, which was built as recently as 1915, as a historical site for protection. However, then Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata urged the agency to designate the dome as a historical site after Hiraoka called on him to do so in person. "It was a step in the right direction for a negative legacy of humanity to be recognized as cultural heritage," Hiraoka said of the 1996 UNESCO decision to add the dome to the World Heritage list. The dome completes its renovation this year, to stand as the symbol of denuclearization in its new coat of rusty brown paint to recreate its look immediately after the bombing. "The biggest thing against humanitarianism is nuclear weapons," Hiraoka said. They are "definitely not an issue of the past," he said. The former mayor said that he hopes people will stand in front of the dome and think about peace and humanity, instead of just seeing it as a tourist attraction. END