Tomorrow (6 August) marks the 65th anniversary of the dropping of the first nuclear bomb in the history of humanity on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, on 9 August 1945, a nuclear bomb struck the Japanese city of Nagasaki. Commenting on this, Federal Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle issued the following statement today (5 August) in Berlin:

“The unbelievable suffering inflicted in Hiroshima and Nagasaki is a lesson for humanity: We must do all we can to ensure a world free of nuclear weapons does not remain a mere vision but becomes a reality. In his speech in Prague, US President Obama clearly marked out the way forward.

Nuclear disarmament and the ongoing reduction of the role of such weapons in nuclear strategies are of paramount importance today. This is a fundamental belief that forms a bond between Germany and Japan.

That is why we will continue to work with determination with Japan and other partners to make progress on nuclear disarmament, particularly when it comes to implementing the results achieved at the 2010 NPT Review Conference.”

More than 200,000 people lost their lives in the two bomb explosions, some of whom immediately, others in the years to follow as a result of the injuries they sustained.

At the NPT Review conference in May 2010, the participating states managed to do what had eluded them five years previously and committed to the goal of completely eliminating all types of nuclear weapons. This means substrategic nuclear weapons are now also included in the continuing disarmament process.