Japan: Nagasaki takes refuge, 75 years after the atomic bomb

Nagasaki devastated after the atomic bomb dropped on the city by the US Air Force B-29 on August 9, 1945. AFP

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Three days after Hiroshima, the United States dropped another atomic bomb, plutonium this time, more powerful than the uranium one, on Nagasaki, in the very south of Japan. It claimed 70,000 victims, including 20,000 people killed instantly. During the commemoration this Sunday, August 9 of the 75th anniversary of the second atomized Japanese city, its mayor Tomihisa Taue appealed to the Japanese government to sign and ratify the UN treaty banning nuclear weapons, ratified by around 40 states. What Japan, the first atomized country in the world, has always refused to do until today.

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with our correspondent in Tokyo, Frédéric Charles

Because the victim of a second atomic massacre useless from a military point of view - Japan was already defeated - the city of Nagasaki considers itself even more entitled to denounce Tokyo's refusal to sign the UN treaty on the ban on nuclear weapons .

Present in Nagasaki this Sunday, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe did not respond to his mayor Tomihisa Taue. Japan depends on the US nuclear umbrella for its security. Shinzo Abe seeks to revise the pacifist Constitution to provide, if necessary, atomic weapons the country of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

North Korea threatens Japan with its missiles. According to a UN report, it would have managed to miniaturize its nuclear warheads to place them on its ballistic weapons. In the face of this threat, Japan is looking to acquire defensive strike capabilities against Pyongyang.

Nuclear deterrence, a "  false security  " according to the Pope

Last November in Nagasaki, Pope Francois denounced the logic of nuclear deterrence guaranteeing peace, "  false security, according to him, which exacerbates tensions in the world  ".

The plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki was even more terrifying than that of Hiroshima. His survivors often presented excruciatingly burnt faces and deformed bodies.

► To listen: The Pope in Nagasaki and Hiroshima: a platform for peace

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  • Japan
  • Second World War
  • United States

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