Hiroshima in 65 Years - 65年目のヒロシマ

With Ambassador Roos participating the Peace Anniversary today, USA finally came to Hiroshima on August 6 for the first time in 65 years. Also present in the ceremony were Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of UN, and representative ambassadors from UK and France. For the citizens of Hiroshima, including myself having mother and sister as hibakusha, it is definitely another memorable and significant step forward after Barack’s speech in Prague, because such A-bomb holding majors as US, UK and France had not accepted Mayor's invitation to August 6 ceremony in the past. Still the fundamental gap might be large between hibakusha’s mentality and US people’s perception, as I thought that the webpage of US Embassy in Japan was an ironical example earlier in the morning: the top article in their Japanese page was John Roos visiting Hiroshima for the ceremony, but there was not a single mention of it in the corresponding English page. Now at a later time, they have posted it (to my relief).



ルース駐日大使の平和記念式典への参列で、アメリカは65年後にようやく8月6日の広島訪問を果たした。今年は他にも国連事務総長、米仏の代理大使などが初参加して、母と姉を被爆者に持つ僕も広島市民として感慨深く、オバマ大統領のプラハ宣言以来また記憶すべき重要な一歩となったように思う。とは言え話はさほど単純ではないし、被爆者と米国民との間には気持の隔たりは依然としてあるだろう。良い例がアメリカ大使館のホームページで、日本語ページではルース大使の広島訪問がトップ記事として出ているのに、英語ページに目を遣るとその一言の言及もないなあ、と思っていたら、遅れて9時半頃に英文記事もアップされた。