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Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba |
Peace Award to Honor
Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba
by BRAD A. MARTELL, Peace and Justice Ministries
Independence, Missouri, USA
Herald, May 2012
In the late 1960s, a young Japanese mathematician came to the United States for doctoral work at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). There, he joined the anti-nuclear movement. Almost 30 years before, MIT professors were part of the Manhattan Project that created the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945.
Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba did not want the world to forget the hibakusha, the survivors of the atomic bombings. In 1979, while teaching in the USA, he started the Hibakusha Travel Grant Program or “Akiba Project.” It brought international journalists to Japan to listen to survivors’ stories. With the help of journalists, the hibakusha experiences were retold to the world in hopes no one ever again would suffer the same fate.
Dr. Akiba, advocate for global nuclear disarmament, will receive the 19th Community of Christ International Peace Award on October 26. The event will be webcast live at www.CofChrist.org from the Temple in Independence, Missouri.
The theme, “Peacemaking: Engaging Nuclear Questions,” honors his life’s work of promoting peace with the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons.
Peacemaking Mayor
Elected to the Japanese House of Representatives in 1990, Dr. Akiba furthered his work toward global peace. In 1999, he was elected mayor of Hiroshima, serving three consecutive terms. As mayor he steadfastly worked to make Hiroshima an “International Peace Culture City.” He committed himself and the city—history’s first victim of nuclear warfare—to lead the movement to abolish nuclear weapons. Through museums and memorials, commemorations and campaigns, and exhibitions and education, Hiroshima reminds and challenges the world to pursue peace and eliminate all nuclear weapons.
At this same time, Dr. Akiba served as president of Mayors for Peace. That group began in 1982. It “strives to raise international public awareness regarding the need to abolish nuclear weapons.” It also seeks to contribute to lasting world peace by working to eliminate starvation and poverty, helping refugees, supporting human rights, protecting the environment, and solving “other problems that threaten peaceful coexistence within the human family” (www.mayorsforpeace.org/english/outlines/objective.html).
Under Dr. Akiba, Mayors for Peace went from 470 member cities in 1999 to 4,402 by 2010. In 2001, he initiated the Hiroshima-Nagasaki Peace Study Course, furthering his work to share the stories of the hibakusha. Fifty-three universities worldwide now offer the course. And under his leadership the 2020 Vision Campaign began in 2003. It seeks elimination of nuclear weapons by 2020, the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Dr. Akiba currently is a professor by special appointment of Hiroshima University. He also serves as the national chair for AFS Intercultural Programs in Japan. AFS, one of the world’s largest student-exchange programs, seeks to build peace by building relationships.
Engaging Our Mission
Community of Christ honors Dr. Akiba’s lifelong work and invites all to attend to hear his message. Dr. Akiba’s dedication to the elimination of nuclear weapons reflects Community of Christ’s commitment to Pursue Peace on Earth, advocating for “responsible reduction and eventual elimination of nuclear armaments,” and to “join with other organizations that are constructively promoting a reduction of instruments of mass destruction” (1982 World Conference Resolution 1178, “Nuclear Arms Reduction”).