Hello everybody! We hope you enjoyed Halloween and that you are getting ready for the winter holidays. It is already November, so Christmas and New Year’s holiday will be here very soon.
In November, I like to start reviewing the year to find the greatest, the worst, and the strangest moments of 2024. One great achiement for Japan was that this year’s Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to Nihon Hidankyo. Nihon Hidankyo is a grassroots group established in 1956 by survivors of the atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The group has spent decades asking governments worldwide to abolish nuclear weapons. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the only places on Earth where atomic bombs have been used on civilian populations, and as seen by the efforts of Nihon Hidankyo, the people of these cities want to make sure these tragedies never happen again.
The news agency Reuters praised the legacy of Nihon Hidankyo. It wrote, “For decades – thanks in large part to the work of Nihon Hidankyo – the destruction unleashed on the two Japanese cities was widely seen as a lesson from history that using nuclear weapons again was too appalling to contemplate.” However, tensions in the world today mean we are closer to the brink of nuclear war than ever before. Russia has warned that the USA’s support of Ukraine increases the risks of nuclear conflict. There are fears that Iran is developing nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, North Korea has declared it is accelerating efforts to become a military superpower and a nuclear power. It is important for us all to remember in these stressful times that peace is the goal, and thanks to groups like Nihon Hidankyo, there is hope for an Earth with no atomic bombs.
Please share your thoughts on this issue when you come to BRIDGE again. Take care and happy studying!
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