hankyoreh

Visitors stand around a memorial stone for Korean victims of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Erected in 1970 by Korean victims of the bombing and Mindan, the stone was originally located outside of the park due to opposition from the city government. However, in May 1995 it was moved into the park, where it stands today. (Kim So-youn/The Hankyoreh)

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced on Sunday that he would visit the memorial to Korean victims of the atomic bomb at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, a gesture that is being welcomed by victims. Kishida will become the second sitting prime minister of Japan to visit the memorial after Keizo Obuchi did so in 1999.

“I am very surprised and pleased that the leaders of South Korea and Japan will come to the memorial to pay their respects,” said Kwon Jun-o, vice chairperson of a special committee for atomic bomb victims in the Hiroshima office of the Korean Residents Union in Japan, speaking to the Hankyoreh.

“I would be even happier if the two leaders also pledged to abolish nuclear weapons,” he added.

Etsuko Nakatani, 73, the president of the Hiroshima branch of the Citizens’ Association for the Relief of A-bomb Victims in South Korea, which supports Korean victims of the bombing, had earlier told Hankyoreh that she hoped the leaders of South Korea and Japan would meet in Hiroshima to discuss the issue of atomic bomb victims.

The prime minister’s decision to visit the memorial has fulfilled the long-time wish of Korean victims of the bombing of Hiroshima.

Kishida was able to make this decision because his home and political roots are in Hiroshima. Representing the most liberal faction of the Liberal Democratic Party (the Kochi faction), Kishida’s greatest political asset could be said to be his determination to realize a world without nuclear weapons.

This is why he chose Hiroshima as the venue for the Group of Seven summit, which will take place on May 19-21. In addition, the idea of visiting the Korean atomic bomb victims is bound to be met with less resistance from the Japanese public than other issues related to Japan’s past, due to the nation’s identity as the only country to have ever had an atomic bomb dropped on it.

The memorial to Korean atomic bomb victims at the site dates back to 1967. A group of Hiroshima-based Koreans, led by atomic bomb victims and the Korean Residents Union in Japan (Mindan), pushed for a memorial to Korean victims of the bombing to be erected inside the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.

After initially responding positively, the city of Hiroshima said it could not allow the memorial to be built in the park, forcing the Korean residents to erect the memorial off park grounds. In May 1999, the monument was moved to its current location in the park thanks to the efforts of Japanese civil society to remember the victims of the bombing.

The inscription reads, “At the end of World War II there were about 100,000 Koreans living in Hiroshima as soldiers, civilian employees of the army, mobilized students and ordinary citizens. When the atomic bomb was dropped on August 6th, 1945, the sacred lives of more than 20,000 Koreans were suddenly taken from our midst.”

It is estimated that 30,000 people from the Korean Peninsula (North and South Korea combined) were killed in Hiroshima, which accounts for 10 percent of the total victims of the bombing.

By Kim So-youn, Tokyo correspondent

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