(Original Spanish contents are from the city of Motril website. English text translated by Ms. Carme Barbany Ciurans, the city of Granollers, Spain)
In its 83rd Global Voyage, the Peaceboat visited the city of Motril, in Spain. The Mayor of Motril, Luisa García Chamorro, welcomed a group of representatives of the NGO and signed the adhesion to Mayors for Peace.
The Peaceboat will visit Motril again next year in its 87th global Voyage in collaboration with Mayors for peace, with the Peace Boat Hibakusha Project.
Peaceboat, with 10 hibakusha on board, docked yesterday in Motril. The City Council with other agencies develop a program of activities with schools to raise awareness of the consequences of radioactivity. It will return to our city on 18 May 2015,
The Mayor of Motril, Luisa García Chamorro met representatives of the nongovernmental organization Peace Boat (Peace Boat) and she have signed the accession agreement of the town to the world conference of ‘Mayors for Peace’ involving 6,000 cities around the globe.
Chamorro Garcia has said that with this decision Motril is committed in the promotion of the campaign for the abolition of nuclear weapons in 2020, the year of the 75th anniversary of the nuclear bombardment of Japanese populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II.
The Motril councilor said that as a city that is now part of this conference, it will appeal to other cities in the region to enroll in this initiative. In addition, exhibitions of posters showing the cities most affected by the use of nuclear weapons against the civilian population will be displayed.
Peace Boat will return to the port of Motril, Spain, next May 18, 2015. The City is working with UNESCO and other organizations to develop a program of activities in which students can learn the testimony of survivors of the two nuclear attacks, coinciding with the 70th anniversary of nuclear attacks.
The hibakusha, Jongkeun Lee, a victim of the bombing, joined the delegation of thePeace Boat in the visit of Motril. Lee was 15 years old when the morning of August 6, 1945, the United States dropped the atomic bomb over Hiroshima. Lee, who was a worker of the national rail network, was about a mile away from the hypocenter and blast burned his skin all over the body. In Hiroshima 120,000 people died and 350,000 other were affected by both radiation and burns caused by the explosion. Two days after, another bomb was dropped over Nagasaki, that killed 80,000 people and left more than 200,000 wounded. Even today there are people who suffer the consequences of radiation, such diverse kind of cancer or birth defects.
Finally, Chamorro Garcia has expressed her determination to bring to schools the exhibition on the damage caused by nuclear bombs and to publicize the risks that can generate the use of atomic energy.
Receiving Mayors for Peace Posters from Peace Boat
(Photo credit: The City of Motril)