Japan's Nagasaki Marks 75th Anniversary Of Atomic Bombing By US

TOKYO (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 09th August, 2020) The southern Japanese port city of Nagasaki marked the 75th anniversary of the United States dropping a nuclear bomb on it, with prayers and calls for a ban on nukes.

The devastating explosion on August 9, 1945 killed tens of thousands instantly, with more dying of exposure to radiation and cancer in the next months and years. The total death toll runs into 70,000. The blast happened three days after the first ever nuclear bombing of neighboring Hiroshima claimed 140,000 lives.

Nagasaki Mayor Tomihisa Taue addressed a smaller than usual gathering of 500 people, including a dwindling number of bombing survivors, calling on the governments of Japan and other countries to sign up to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

"The treaty took effect 50 years ago and is crucial for the humanity, yet more and more nuclear states have been saying in the past years they do not want to abide by the nuclear disarmament clause... This increases the threat that nuclear weapons will be used," Taue said.

A minute of silence was held at 11:02 a.m. local time, the exact moment when the US B-29 warplane dropped a massive plutonium bomb on the city, forcing Japan to surrender and ending World War II.

The ceremony was attended by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and other Japanese and foreign dignitaries. Abe reiterated his commitment to a world without nuclear weapons, despite him repeatedly refusing to sign up to the nuclear ban treaty.