4037 cities demand the elimination of nuclear weapons

1.7 2010

Mayors for Peace proudly announced today that 4,037 member cities in
144 countries and regions have joined the campaign to eliminate nuclear
weapons by 2020. Mayors for Peace is a network of local governments
headquartered in the City of Hiroshima. Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba, the Mayor of
Hiroshima and President of Mayors for Peace spearheads an international
campaign for nuclear weapon states to stop considering cities as targets for
weapons of mass destruction.

In June 72 new members were welcomed. The previous months we see systematic
growth of membership as a result of coordinated efforts in Australia,
Brazil, Canada, Greece, Italy, Japan, Spain, Sweden and the USA, while a new
effort was developed in Ethiopia last month

Mayors for Peace congratulates the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) for
unanimously adopting a groundbreaking resolution last month at the
conclusion of its 78th annual USCM meeting in Oklahoma City on June 14,
2010.. The resolution is Supporting U.S. Participation in Global Elimination
of Nuclear Weapons and Redirection of Nuclear Weapons Spending to Meet the
Needs of Cities ( more details ).
Membership of Mayors for Peace continues to grow at a record pace; with
over one thousand cities having joined Mayors for Peace since August 2009.
With over half of the one hundred most populous cities of the world and over
half of the capital cities of the world now members, the organization
represents over three-quarters of a billion people around the world. This
unprecedented growth demonstrates the determination of cities around the
world to abolish nuclear weapons to protect their citizens from nuclear
annihilation.

Last month membership increased significantly in Australia (8), Brazil (1),
Canada (2), Ethiopia (4) Germany (1), Greece (2), Italy (1), Japan (39),
Macedonia (1), Mexico (1) Spain (5), Sweden (2), Thailand (1), USA (2),
Venezuela (1) and Viet Nam (1).

The general distribution of membership remains unchanged form last month.
Nearly half of our member mayors are from Europe (1,984 +12); Asia has the
second largest number of members (1,171 +41); followed by Latin America and
the Caribbean (313 +3); North-America (248 +4), Africa (210 +4) and Oceania
(111 +8).

To work with cities around the world, the Mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki founded Mayors for Peace at a Special Session on Disarmament at the UN in 1982. In 2003 the organization launched the 2020 Vision, a campaign to abolish nuclear weapons by the year 2020. Mayors for Peace has organized Mayoral Delegations to all the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review
Conferences and Preparatory Committees meetings since 2004, calling for a commencement of negotiations towards the realization of peaceful world free from nuclear weapons.

In 2008 Mayors for Peace advanced the Hiroshima-Nagasaki Protocol, a clear roadmap towards the total abolition of nuclear weapons by 2020. At the citizen level the organization conducted a Cities Are Not Targets project, a petition drive to support the total abolition of nuclear weapons by 2020.

On the occasion of the 2010 NPT Review Conference this past May more than 1 million signatures were submitted to the president of the NPT Review
Conference at the UN in New York.

In August 1945, a single atomic bombs dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki instantaneously reduced them to rubble, taking vast numbers of precious lives. To ensure that the atomic tragedy is never repeated
anywhere on earth, Hiroshima and Nagasaki have consistently sought to persuade the world that nuclear weapons are inhumane and have continually
called for their total abolition.