“Paper crane displayed in Sadako’s hospital room” given to former U.S. President Barack Obama
Mar. 2, 2025
Sadako’s nephew Yuji meets Obama in Hawaii
by Kana Kobayashi, Staff Writer
One of the paper cranes believed to have been displayed in the hospital room of Sadako Sasaki has been presented to former U.S. President Barack Obama. Yuji Sasaki, 54, Sadako’s nephew who lives in Tokyo, met with Mr. Obama in his home state of Hawaii on February 26 (local time) and handed it to him. Sadako was the model for the Children’s Peace Monument in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, located in the city’s Naka Ward.
Sadako’s older brother Masahiro Sasaki, 83, found the paper crane in the Buddhist altar in his home in the city of Nakagawa, Fukuoka Prefecture. As the crane has a hole for connecting it with other cranes to make a thousand paper cranes tied together on a string, it is believed to have been one of the paper cranes hung in Sadako’s hospital room. According to Yuji, who visited Hawaii, Mr. Obama showed his appreciation and listened with deep emotion to the story of Sadako, who died of leukemia 10 years after the atomic bombing at the age of 12.
Mr. Obama visited Hiroshima as the first sitting U.S. president in 2016. Sadako Legacy, a Tokyo-based nonprofit organization of which Masahiro serves as director, has been ardently hoping to meet Mr. Obama to call on him to give further support for the realization of the peaceful world without nuclear weapons.
Yuji, vice-director of the NPO, said, “I hope this paper crane will help so that no one will have to go through the same suffering of Hiroshima.”
(Originally published on March 2, 2025)
