Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has condemned the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, saying the mindset behind such attacks remains present in Washington today.
The United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6th and 9th, 1945, respectively, marking the first use of nuclear weapons in warfare.
According to published reports, about 140,000 people were killed in Hiroshima and around 74,000 in Nagasaki.
The figures include people who survived the initial explosions but later died from exposure to radiation.
‘On this anniversary of the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki – among the greatest crimes against humanity – those who reject that horror must also condemn the same mentality in Washington that today threatens to wipe out nations and destroy civilian infrastructure,’ he said on Saturday.
‘Never again,’ the president asserted.
Pezeshkian was referring to numerous threats by US President Donald Trump against Iran, including bringing Iran ‘back to the Stone Age’ and that ‘a whole civilisation will die’ as a result of US assaults.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, speaking at the ceremony to mark the 81st anniversary of the Nagasaki atomic bombing yesterday, failed to mention that the bomb on the city was dropped by the United States.
‘81 years ago, Nagasaki was fully destroyed by a single atomic bomb,’ she said, without elaborating on who dropped it.
However, Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki, who delivered his speech before Takaichi, admitted that the bomb was dropped by ‘a US military plane’.
However, in a statement, read out by UN Under-Secretary-General of Disarmament Affairs Izumi Nakamitsu, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also did not directly name the country that bombed Nagasaki in his message marking the 81st anniversary of the attack.
Three days earlier, during a similar ceremony marking the Hiroshima bombing, Guterres, Takaichi and Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui also stopped short of directly naming the culprit.
Japanese officials generally do not emphasise in public speeches that the United States carried out the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
At the same time, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum presents comprehensive information about the atomic bombings of 1945.
Japanese school and university textbooks also cover their history in detail.
The United States carried out the atomic bombings of the two cities at the very end of World War II, with the officially stated aim of accelerating Japan’s surrender.
The United States still does not acknowledge moral responsibility for the atomic bombings, justifying its actions as a ‘military necessity’.
Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev slammed Japanese officials for failing to name the United States as responsible for the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, saying Tokyo’s deepening alignment with Washington has come at the expense of historical accountability.
‘What a disgrace that, in recalling the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki recently, not once did Japan’s Prime Minister or any other Japanese official bother to mention who did it,’ Medvedev said last Thursday.
He said Japan had become an ‘official vassal’ of the United States and warned that it could eventually become a ‘ronin’, a Japanese samurai who had lost his master or severed ties with his former clan.
Medvedev’s remarks came after Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui criticised Russia over the Ukraine conflict during a ceremony marking the 81st anniversary of the US atomic bombing, of the city, while making no mention of Washington’s responsibility for the attack.
Former President Joe Biden, who attended the Group of Seven summit in Hiroshima in May 2023, did not apologise for the nuclear attacks.
Neither did Barack Obama, who in 2016 became the first sitting US president to visit the memorial.
US President Donald Trump has not visited the memorials in Hiroshima or Nagasaki, although the two Japanese cities invited him both during his first presidential term and after his return to the White House.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi likewise refrained from mentioning the United States during the memorial ceremony.
Iran has condemned the continued expansion and modernisation of the US nuclear arsenal, warning that Washington’s nuclear policies endanger global security and humanity.
The anniversary came as Japan faces growing debate over its post-war security policy, with Takaichi’s government considering changes to the country’s long-standing Three Non-Nuclear Principles.
Tokyo is reviewing the principles, which prohibit possessing nuclear weapons, producing them, and allowing their deployment on Japanese territory, with Takaichi specifically supporting a review of the third restriction.
The move could allow US to deploy nuclear weapons on Japanese soil as Tokyo increases its reliance on American weapons and technology.
Japan’s remilitarisation, largely driven by US military equipment and technology, has heightened tensions with its neighbours, particularly China and North Korea.
The military build-up has also carried economic costs, with China, Japan’s second-largest trading partner after the United States, imposing sanctions on several Japanese companies involved in the country’s military programmes.
‘We hope Japan will recognise its mistakes, reverse its wrongful course, genuinely reflect on its past and return to the right track,’ China’s Ministry of Commerce said on July 29th.
‘Instead of reflecting on its past and correcting its course, Japan has continued down the wrong path’ by accelerating remilitarisation, deploying offensive weapons, and launching missiles, the ministry added.
Tokyo has also expanded its military posture by deploying longer-range missiles and easing restrictions on weapons exports, including the planned deployment of a Type-12 missile launcher on the remote island of Minamitorishima in the north western Pacific Ocean.
The deployment would extend Japan’s strike capabilities and potentially allow it to target areas along China’s coastline in the event of a military confrontation.
