Japanese atomic bomb survivors awarded Nobel Peace Prize

The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded on Friday the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize to the Japanese organisation Nihon Hidankyo.

The award’s committee said in a statement that the grassroots movement which was formed by survivors in 1956, a decade after the atomic bombs attacks of 1945, had “worked tirelessly” to raise awareness about the humanitarian consequences of using nuclear weapons.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee commended Nihon Hidankyo 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 committee explained that it wished “to honour all atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki who despite physical suffering and painful memories have chosen to use their costly experience to cultivate hope and engagement for peace”.

“They help us to describe the indescribable, to think the unthinkable and to somehow grasp the incomprehensible pain and suffering caused by nuclear weapons”, the committee added.

Winners of the Nobel Prize typically receive 11 million Swedish krona (USD 1.06 million), although multiple winners share the sum.

Source: Kuwait News Agency