The Nobel Peace Prize was on Friday awarded to the Japanese anti-nuclear group Nihon Hidankyo, a grassroots movement of atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, who are also known as Hibakusha.
The group received the honour "for its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again," said Jorgen Watne Frydnes, the chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee in Oslo.
Frydnes said the award was made as the “taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure”.
Nihon Hidankyo was receiving the prize "for its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again," the Norwegian Nobel Committee said in its citation.
Notion that nuclear weapons 'maintain peace' is a fallacy, Nihon Hidankyo head says
Nihon Hidankyo co-head Toshiyuki Mimaki, who was standing by at the Hiroshima City Hall for the announcement, cheered and teared up when he received the news.
“Is it really true? Unbelievable!” Toshiyuki screamed.
Speaking to reporters at a news conference in Tokyo, he said the idea that nuclear weapons bring peace is a fallacy.
"It has been said that because of nuclear weapons, the world maintains peace. But nuclear weapons can be used by terrorists," Toshiyuki told reporters. "For example, if Russia uses them against Ukraine, Israel against Gaza, it won't end there. Politicians should know these things."
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Friday hailed the awarding of the Peace Prize to Nihon Hidankyo as "extremely meaningful".
"The fact that the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to this organisation, which has spent many years working towards the abolition of nuclear weapons, is extremely meaningful," he told reporters.
Peace award against a backdrop of global conflicts
Efforts to eradicate nuclear weapons have been honoured in the past by the Nobel committee. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons won the Peace Prize in 2017, and Joseph Rotblat and the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs won in 1995 for “their efforts to diminish the part played by nuclear arms in international politics and, in the longer run, to eliminate such arms”.
This year's prize was awarded against a backdrop of devastating conflicts raging in the world, notably in the Middle East, Ukraine and Sudan.
Alfred Nobel stated in his will that the prize should be awarded for "the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.
Last year’s prize went to jailed Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi for her advocacy of women’s rights and democracy and against the death penalty. The Nobel committee said it also was a recognition of “the hundreds of thousands of people” who demonstrated against “Iran’s theocratic regime’s policies of discrimination and oppression targeting women”.
In a year of conflict, there had been some speculation before the announcement that the Nobel committee would opt not to award a prize at all.
The Nobel prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million). Unlike the other Nobel prizes that are selected and announced in Stockholm, founder Alfred Nobel decreed the peace prize be decided and awarded in Oslo by the five-member Norwegian Nobel Committee.
The Nobel season ends Monday with the announcement of the winner of the economics prize, formally known as the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)
