Japan holds ceremony on 79th anniversary of Nagasaki bombing

Japan on Friday marked the 79th anniversary of the US atomic bombing of the city of Nagasaki, which left tens of thousands of people dead.    

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida attended the ceremony while envoys from Israel, the United States and the United Kingdom were conspicuous in their absence. He said Japan is striving for a "world without nuclear weapons," according to Japanese broadcaster NHK.  

Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki also gave remarks at the event and said the world is facing a "critical situation" now due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and concerns about military escalation in the Middle East. 

"With no end in sight to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and fears of an escalation of armed conflict in the Middle East, important norms that have been upheld could be lost. We are facing such a critical situation," Suzuki said at the ceremony. 

US, UK ambassadors skip event due to Israel snub

Earlier this week, US Ambassador Rahm Emanuel said that he would not attend this year's event, as Israeli Ambassador to Japan Gilad Cohen had not been invited. 

Nagasaki Mayor Suzuki has said that the decision was "not political" and was intended to prevent demonstrations or disturbances during the ceremony. 

The US Embassy to Japan has said Emanuel did not attend the Nagasaki event because it had been "politicized." The British embassy said UK Ambassador to Japan Julia Longbottom would also not be attending because "it creates an unfortunate and misleading equivalency with Russia and Belarus — the only other countries not invited to this year's ceremony."     

The ambassadors of Germany, France and several other countries were also not at the event, with lower-level diplomatic representatives instead sent to attend the ceremony. 

Emanuel on Friday instead attended a prayer meeting in Tokyo in remembrance of Nagasaki. Israel's Cohen and the UK's Longbottom were also at that event.   

A memorial ceremony was held in Hiroshima on Tuesday to remember the atomic bombings there, with Israel's Cohen invited to that commemoration. 

Why was Nagasaki hit by an atomic bomb in 1945?

The US bombed Nagasaki, along with Hiroshima, in 1945 towards the end of the World War II. The Hiroshima bombing on August 6, 1945, killed an estimated 140,000 people, with the August 9 bombing of Nagasaki killing an estimated 74,000.    

On August 15, 1945, Japanese Emperor Hirohito announced that Japan would surrender, with Allied powers and Japan signing a formal Instrument of Surrender on September 2 of that year.  

Whether the atomic bombings were necessary to end the war is still a topic of debate among historians.

Some historians back the view that the bombs were necessary to avoid an Allied land invasion of Japan, which could potentially have caused the loss of many more lives on both the Japanese and Allied sides.

Others, however, say Japan was on the verge of surrendering anyway and likely would have done so without deploying the bombs. 

wd/ab (AFP, dpa)