Sadako Sasaki’s family and other groups apply for inscription to Memory of the World register for her paper cranes, notes and graduation certificate
Sep. 1, 2023
by Masanori Wada, Staff Writer
Several people, including surviving family members of Sadako Sasaki, a girl whose death of A-bomb-induced leukemia led to an initiative to build the “Children’s Peace Monument” in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in the city’s Naka Ward, have applied to the Japanese National Commission for United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) so the paper cranes and other items she left behind can be inscribed on the Memory of the World international register.
According to Sadako Legacy, a Tokyo-based Non-Profit Organization (NPO) for which her surviving family members serve as representatives, and the City of Hiroshima, the application was made jointly on August 28, by a council for promoting the registration, which consists of Sadako Legacy, the Hiroshima Prefectural government, and the city, and the A-bomb survivors’ group in Brazil. The application includes nine items, including roughly 100 paper cranes folded by Sadako and possessed by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in Naka Ward, another paper crane given by her family to the survivors’ group in Brazil, a note written by Sadako to record her blood test, and her graduation certificate from her alma mater, Nobori-cho Elementary School in Naka Ward.
If the domestic screening committee decides to nominate those items from Japan, UNESCO would review them in 2025 and announce whether or not they would be added to the register that year. Yuji Sasaki, 53, Sadako’s nephew and chair of Sadako Legacy, said, “We want to aim at registration of her paper cranes to the Memory of the World so they can be broadly known to the world as a symbol of peace.”
(Originally published on September 1, 2023)
Several people, including surviving family members of Sadako Sasaki, a girl whose death of A-bomb-induced leukemia led to an initiative to build the “Children’s Peace Monument” in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in the city’s Naka Ward, have applied to the Japanese National Commission for United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) so the paper cranes and other items she left behind can be inscribed on the Memory of the World international register.
According to Sadako Legacy, a Tokyo-based Non-Profit Organization (NPO) for which her surviving family members serve as representatives, and the City of Hiroshima, the application was made jointly on August 28, by a council for promoting the registration, which consists of Sadako Legacy, the Hiroshima Prefectural government, and the city, and the A-bomb survivors’ group in Brazil. The application includes nine items, including roughly 100 paper cranes folded by Sadako and possessed by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in Naka Ward, another paper crane given by her family to the survivors’ group in Brazil, a note written by Sadako to record her blood test, and her graduation certificate from her alma mater, Nobori-cho Elementary School in Naka Ward.
If the domestic screening committee decides to nominate those items from Japan, UNESCO would review them in 2025 and announce whether or not they would be added to the register that year. Yuji Sasaki, 53, Sadako’s nephew and chair of Sadako Legacy, said, “We want to aim at registration of her paper cranes to the Memory of the World so they can be broadly known to the world as a symbol of peace.”
(Originally published on September 1, 2023)
