Emperor, empress commemorate A-bomb victims in Hiroshima
Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako lay flowers at the cenotaph at the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima on Thursday.
Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako on Thursday renewed their hope for peace as they visited Hiroshima to pay their respects to atomic bomb victims on the 80th anniversary year of the end of World War II.
In their first trip to the city since the emperor's accession in 2019, the imperial couple laid white flowers and bowed deeply at a cenotaph in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, which holds the names of around 340,000 victims of the Aug 6, 1945, atomic bombing.
They later visited an exhibition hall in the park displaying relics of the atomic bombing, where the emperor remarked that it was "heartbreaking" to learn the area near the hypocenter had once been a densely populated residential neighborhood.
At the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, the couple viewed photographs depicting the devastation and a panel display on Nihon Hidankyo, Japan's leading atomic bomb survivors' group and the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
They then listened to stories from three survivors in their early 90s, joined by two younger people in their 20s and 30s who are helping pass on memories of the bombing.
"We mourn the people who died by the dropping of the atomic bomb 80 years ago. We also thought about the hardships the people of Hiroshima have gone through until now and renewed our hope for peace," the imperial couple said in a statement released after their trip.
Emperor Naruhito's grandfather, Emperor Hirohito -- posthumously known as Emperor Showa -- first visited Hiroshima after the bombing in December 1947.
Calls to hold Emperor Hirohito accountable for Japan's actions continued long after the war, with his comment at a 1975 press conference that the bombings were "unavoidable" causing further controversy.
Meanwhile, Emperor Naruhito's parents, former Emperor Akihito and former Empress Michiko, visited the cenotaph in Hiroshima five times during his reign. They also visited hospitals and nursing homes for atomic bomb survivors, showing deep concern for their suffering.
The imperial couple observes a moment of silence every year on four days commemorating World War II -- Okinawa Memorial Day, the anniversaries of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the anniversary of Japan's surrender -- a tradition that the current emperor and his wife have followed.
Emperor Naruhito last visited the cenotaph in October 2006 when he was still crown prince, while Empress Masako last joined him around 25 years ago in November 2000.
As part of memorial visits to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the war, the couple in April visited Iwoto Island, formerly known as Iwojima, the site of a fierce battle in the Pacific between Japan and the United States, and Okinawa earlier this month with their daughter, Princess Aiko.
The imperial couple are scheduled to visit Nagasaki, the other atomic-bombed city, in September.
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