×

News

High school students visiting U.S. meet with congressman and hand letter addressed to president

by Junji Akechi, Staff Writer, dispatched from Washington, D.C.

On the afternoon of March 24, three high school students of the "No Nuke Network: Students of Hiroshima Against Nuclear Weapons," who are appealing for the elimination of nuclear weapons while in the United States, met with Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic Congressman, in Washington, D.C. and handed him 1,000 paper cranes and a letter addressed to U.S. President Barack Obama.

Yuji Kanemori, 17, Tomoko Takamoto, 17, and Yuki Okada, 16, visited the office of Mr. Kucinich, who is known for proposing the establishment of a U.S. Department of Peace. The students handed Mr. Kucinich a letter that they, along with other members of their group, had written to call on President Obama to visit Hiroshima, and 1,000 paper cranes folded by Hiroshima citizens. Mr. Kucinich commented that he would surely hand them to the president and the president would be glad to receive them.

The high school students conveyed their wish for nuclear abolition, saying, "We were born and raised in the A-bombed city of Hiroshima. The horror of nuclear weapons and the importance of peace are things that we feel personally." Mr. Kucinich nodded to them and offered words of encouragement, saying that peace was something people should make efforts to achieve and that their message had the power to help change the world.

In response to the call of the No Nuke Network for paper cranes, about 45,000 paper cranes, folded with the wish for nuclear abolition, have been collected. The remaining paper cranes will be shipped to the United States as early as this month.

(Originally published on March 26, 2010)

Related articles
Hiroshima students visit U.S. high school and speak to American students about atomic bombing (March 26, 2010)
High school students from Hiroshima learn about current state of U.S. ratification of CTBT (March 25, 2010)

Archives