No to Banning Nuclear Weapons

With no persuasive reason, the only country in the world that suffered from devastation of nuclear war seventy-one years ago voted no to a pact which would prohibit nuclear weapons to any country. Under the heavy pressure from United States, which provided with nuclear umbrella, Japan defied broad movement to ban nuclear weapons in United Nations. Japan can lose its grip on nuclear disarmament, which has been the raison d’être as a nation desiring peace.

The First Committee on Disarmament of U.N. General Assembly passed a resolution for starting negotiation over a treaty banning nuclear weapons next year. One hundred and twenty-three countries, including Austria, Brazil or even Iran and North Korea, voted yes to the resolution. It expressed deep concern on a devastative humanitarian consequences brought by use of nuclear weapons and required negotiation for legally binding document of banning nuclear weapons. Sixteen countries including China abstained from voting.

Japan joined a group of thirty-eight countries, represented by United States, United Kingdom or Russia, that voted no to the resolution. They opposed radical progress to prohibit nuclear weapons and upheld gradual reduction of nuclear weapons focusing on maintaining security. “That was because it would generate opposition between nuclear possessors and non-nuclear states,” told Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs, Fumio Kishida, about the reason why Japan voted against the resolution.

United States had a great concern on the resolution, recognizing it as eroding long-time strategic stability that had been supporting international security regime. It urged its allies not to vote yes to the resolution. Having considered the options on abstention, Japanese government decided to follow its protector against its longtime principle of regarding nuclear weapon as an absolute evil.

It was natural response that nuclear sufferers in Japan denounced that diplomatic behavior of their government. “I would call Japan a fool. What is it doing, anyway?” said Sunao Tsuboi, who was exposed to nuclear explosion in Hiroshima seventy-one years ago and exchanged short conversation with U.S. President Barack Obama in his first visit to Hiroshima as a representative of hibakusha this fall. While hibakushas welcomed passing the resolution as a positive step for nuclear disarmament, they were deeply embarrassed with unreasonable double standard exercised by Japan.

Seventy-one years ago, the Japanese saw Hiroshima under a huge umbrella of nuclear mushroom. Now they are feeling safe under nuclear umbrella of the nation that dropped nuclear bombs on Japan. Staying there meanwhile means giving that inhumane weapon a chance to survive, threatening a number of lives on this planet. But, Japan looks like no longer having a determination to lead the movement for the world without nuclear weapons.