With the kind support of
Cities are Not Targets
Message from
Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba
Mayor of Hiroshima and
President Mayors for Peace
Dear fellow mayor,
Peace is precious! Cities Are Not Targets!
When a city becomes a battleground, everything generations of mayors and citizens have worked so hard to build is destroyed. When international stability supposedly depends on mutual assured destruction, the hostages – cities – are in grave danger.
Mayors for Peace is the leading international organization devoted to protecting cities from the scourge of war and mass destruction. Our effectiveness depends crucially on the allegiance and solidarity of cities throughout the world.
I ask you now because we are preparing for the most important event on the nuclear disarmament calendar in five years: the May 2010 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. We are 3488 strong now, but we aim to be 5000 strong by May. We will then represent one billion citizens when we speak at the Review Conference. Our right to be heard – and heeded – will be indisputable.
Our message is simple: eliminate the nuclear threat. Since this can technically be done by the year 2020, it would, in our view, be criminal to hold cities in jeopardy any longer. The immediate task at hand is to begin joint planning now. In a multilateral world, that means negotiating a legally binding agreement that establishes the international institutions required to achieve and maintain a nuclear-weapon-free world. This is our 2020 Vision, and we are so confident of success that Hiroshima and Nagasaki are now exploring the feasibility of hosting the 2020 Olympic Games as a global celebration of the end of the nuclear threat to cities and the world.
The International Decade for Disarmament begins in 2010. Mayors for Peace and the 2020 Vision Campaign will provide member cities with ideas and examples of how cities can and are helping to make the Decade a success – indeed, the decisive decade for nuclear disarmament.
But the first step we are hoping you will take is to join Mayors for Peace. I have attached a Registration Form for you. Please return it now, so we can count you among the 5000 strong in May. Thank you!
Most sincerely,
Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba
Mayor of Hiroshima
& President Mayors for Peace
Membership Registration Form
Download your copy of the 32-pages Mayors for Peace Progress Report 2009 today. Click here
