Keiko Ogura wants to share her heartbreaking experience with some of the world’s most prominent individuals.
On Friday, G7 leaders met privately with 85-year-old Hiroshima resident Ogura, an A-bomb survivor.
Later, Ogura informed reporters that the leaders showed tremendous sorrow as she talked in English for 10 minutes.
“I think I conveyed the fact that once a nuclear weapon is used, people will be suffering for a long time,”
Ogura was 8 when the atomic bomb exploded 2.4 kilometers southwest of her house. A blast of light knocked her down. Her house’s roof and ceiling were blasted off when she turned around. She noticed lines of people walking with scorched hair and skin.
After the war, she feared prejudice towards hibakusha, radiation victims. After her husband Kaoru, the 1970-71 museum director, died suddenly at 58 in 1979, she changed her mind.
“If you don’t tell your story, who will?” a foreign journalist told her in sadness. She committed.
She learned English and founded a civic club in 1984 to share hibakusha stories with outsiders. She has recounted her experience to over 60 nations at the museum and internationally.
Following his February 2014 invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly hinted about deploying nuclear weapons, filling Ogura with dread.
However, the G7 conference in Hiroshima bolstered her efforts. “A-bomb victims who regretfully died with vexation are buried beneath the Peace Memorial Park,” she thought. “I want their superiors to understand.”
On Friday, she said, “Welcome to Hiroshima.” She claimed she used such warm remarks to show that nuclear weapon-possessing nations, including the US that bombed Japan, could work together to create a “world without nuclear weapons.”
Ogura informed the leaders she thought they would advance after witnessing the bomb scene.
Ogura thanked each leader after her speech. Ogura claimed one husband regretted not talking more and inquired if she had written a book about her experiences as they left.
Ogura expressed optimism that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will attend the G7 summit: “Children are crying now because of the war. I hope the meeting will unify countries and find answers so no one has to endure as I did.”
