Hiroshima Tree Planting Ceremony

On 21 July, Ambassador Kusaka attended the Hiroshima Tree Planting Ceremony held at the Australian National University (ANU). The ceremony was also attended by Professor Gareth Evans, Chancellor of ANU, Professor Ramesh Thakur, Director of the Centre for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament and Mr James Carouso- Deputy Chief of Mission of the Embassy of the United States of America, among other guests. It was organised as part of the Green Legacy Hiroshima, an initiative which aims to convey a message of peace by presenting trees which survived the Hiroshima atomic bombing to organisations all over the world.  
 
Professor Thakur opened the Ceremony and speeches were then delivered by Professor Evans, Ambassador Kusaka and Mr Carouso. In his speech, Professor Evans spoke about his previous visit to Hiroshima, the fear and risks surrounding nuclear weapons, the visit of US President Obama to Hiroshima in May, and concluded by stating “out of the ashes of Hiroshima a better and more humane world can indeed grow. That is the core idea behind this tree planting today.”
 
Ambassador Kusaka then spoke about the single tree which survived the September 11 terror attack in New York in 2001, as well as the miracle lone pine tree which remained standing after the Tsunami in the Tohoku region in 2011. He said that these trees and the Hiroshima atomic bomb survivor trees are a symbol of energy and hope, and that he strongly admires the activities of Green Legacy Hiroshima.  
 
By sharing the true effects of atomic bombings with the international community, Japan, as the sole country to have experienced atomic bombings, intends to call for both nuclear weapon states and non-nuclear weapon states to work together in order to make concrete progress towards a world without nuclear weapons.