On August 9, Nagasaki paid respect to those who perished as a result of the US atomic explosion 77 years earlier. The mayor said that the world had learned from Russia's conflict with Ukraine that another nuclear attack is not only a worry but rather "an actual and current problem."
In a speech delivered on Tuesday at the Nagasaki Peace Park, Mayor Tomihisa Taue asserted that nuclear weapons can be used indefinitely and that the only way to safeguard humankind's future is to eliminate them.
After pledging in a statement with four other nuclear countries that nuclear war should never be fought, Russia invaded Ukraine and threatened to use nuclear weapons only one month later, Taue remarked.
Taue pointed out that only one month had passed since Russia and four other nuclear-armed states signed a declaration promising that nuclear war should never be waged. At that time, Russia invaded Ukraine and threatened to use nuclear weapons.
A minute of silence was observed by participants, including diplomats from nuclear powers, at 11:02 a.m., the exact time the bomb detonated above the city in southern Japan on August 9, 1945.
Japanese leaders fear that China may become even more assertive in East Asia as a result of the conflict, and the government is pressing for a further increase in Japan's military spending and capability.
As a US ally, Japan hosts 50,000 US troops and is covered by the US nuclear umbrella despite its renunciation of nuclear weapons ownership, manufacture, and hosting. Although several hawkish legislators in the governing party have also suggested a potential of nuclear cooperation with the United States, the Russian nuclear threat has nonetheless prompted them to do so.
Despite Russia's last-week attempt to backpedal on Putin's warning, because Russia has been waging war on Ukraine since February, there have been growing concerns about a third nuclear assault. Last week, Russia bombarded a Ukrainian city near the biggest nuclear power plant in Europe.