On October 9, past Mayors for Peace President and former Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba received the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s Distinguished Peace Leadership Award in Santa Barbara, California. Shigeko Sasamori, a survivor of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima received the World Citizenship Award on behalf of all Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors (hibakusha). The awards were presented during the Foundation’s 28th Annual Evening for Peace, “From Hiroshima to Hope.”
According to Foundation President David Kreiger, “The hibakusha and mayor Akiba have been very eloquent in making the case for eliminating nuclear weapons and we honor them for that.”
Santa Barbara Mayor Helene Schneider and other local elected officials, many high school and college students, two other hibakusha, and Mayors for Peace North American Coordinator, Jackie Cabasso, were among the guests at the well-attended event.
Presenting the award to Dr. Akiba, Kreiger noted that under his leadership Mayors for Peace membership had increased from 440 mayors to nearly 5,000. Stating that it is “a tremendous honor for me to be recognized,” Akiba credited the hibakusha’s strong advocacy for life for the fact that a third nuclear weapon has not been used. Reiterating his support for the Mayors for Peace “2020 vision,” Akiba explained, “Cities are where people live, with diversity and tolerance. Cities give us hope.” But, he warned, with the average age of the hibakusha now 77 years, progress toward a world without nuclear weapons is too slow. He concluded on an upbeat note: “We can accomplish a Nuclear Weapons Convention by 2015 to abolish nuclear weapons by 2020. Yes we can!”
Past recipients of the Distinguished Peace Leadership Award include Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, the late French explorer Jacques Cousteau, and the Dalai Lama.
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