This Saturday in Eugene, peace activists will mark the 77th anniversary of the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan.
The Second World War ended shortly after the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed by the United States. The resulting devastation and suffering sparked a movement against nuclear weapons.
People release paper lanterns into a pond at a 2019 event in Eugene honoring victims of nuclear bombings and radiation.
Melorie Begay / KLCC
“We still deal with it, generations later,” said Aimee Yogi, of the Japanese American Association of Lane County, an organizer of the annual event. She witnessed the power of nuclear weapons in Hawaii, roughly 60 years ago when an above-ground nuclear test was held hundreds of miles away.
“And we saw the light of a nuclear bomb, and it just got really silent,” recalled Yogi. “We didn’t cheer or anything. And what it said to me was, ‘We can destroy the world.’”
Besides the victims of the bombings in mainland Japan, Yogi says the event is for those sickened or affected by nuclear radiation through the decades.
The commemoration is also organized by the Asian American Council of Oregon and the Community Alliance of Lane County.
For more information, visit www.AsianCouncil.org.
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