Tokyo: The mayor of Nagasaki said on Thursday it was “unfortunate” that the US and British ambassadors refused to attend a ceremony marking the 1945 atomic bombing of the Japanese city because Israel was condemned.
But he defended the decision not to invite Israel to Friday's annual event, reiterating that it was “not political” but to avoid potential protests related to the Gaza conflict.
“It is unfortunate that they have told us that their ambassadors cannot attend,” Shiro Suzuki told reporters.
Nagasaki City Mayor Shiro Suzuki speaks to the media at City Hall in Nagasaki on August 8, 2024, a day before the annual memorial commemorating the 79th anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city. (JIJI Press via AFP)
“We have taken a broad decision not for political reasons. We want to conduct a grand ceremony in a peaceful and grand atmosphere.”
On August 9, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, killing 74,000 people, including those who survived the blast but later died from radiation exposure.
It came three days after the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, killing 140,000 people.
Japan announced its surrender in World War II on August 15, 1945.
The United States, Britain, France, Italy and the European Union – as well as reportedly Canada and Australia – are all sending diplomats below ambassadorial level to the ceremony.
Only the US and British embassies made a clear connection to Nagasaki's decision not to invite Israel's ambassador, Gilad Cohen, although a source told AFP that Italy's move was also a direct result.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said the United States believed it was “important to invite the Israeli ambassador just as ambassadors of other countries are invited, not to single out any country.”
“I think our position on this and our respect for Japan on this anniversary is well documented, and the ambassador goes far beyond not attending an event,” Miller said.
A mushroom cloud rises over 60,000 feet over Nagasaki, Japan, after the American bomber “Enola Gay” drops an atomic bomb on August 9, 1945. (Shutterstock)
U.S. Ambassador Rahm Emanuel, who was former President Barack Obama's chief of staff, plans to visit a shrine in Tokyo instead.
Obama's ambassador to Japan, John Roos, became the first US representative to attend the Hiroshima commemoration in 2010 and followed suit in Nagasaki two years later.
Obama visited Hiroshima in 2016. The United States has never apologized for the bombing, the only nuclear attack in history.
The British embassy said that leaving Israel “created an unfortunate and confusing analogy with Russia and Belarus – the only other countries not invited to this year's ceremony.” Germany echoed that position.
A French embassy spokesman called Suzuki's decision “regrettable and questionable”.
Cohen, who attended a similar memorial service in Hiroshima on Tuesday, said last week that the Nagasaki decision had “sent the wrong message to the world”.
On Thursday, Cohen thanked “all countries for standing with Israel and protesting its boycott of the Nagasaki peace ceremony.”
“Thank you for standing with us on the right side of history,” Cohen said on X, formerly Twitter.
