No Means of Relief if Nuclear Weapons Used: Hidankyo Member

New York, Sept. 1 (Jiji Press)--There will be no means of providing relief once nuclear weapons are used, a senior member of Nihon Hidankyo, or the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations, said at a conference at the U.N. headquarters Tuesday.

"No country or international organization has the means to provide relief" if nuclear weapons are used, Masako Wada, assistant secretary-general of Hidankyo and a hibakusha atomic bomb survivor, said in a speech at the first international conference on support for victims of nuclear weapons use and testing, and for environmental restoration.

Wada, 82, was exposed to radiation at the age of one from the U.S. atomic bombing of the southwestern Japan city of Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, in the closing days of World War II.

Recalling her mother's remark that "people weren't born just to be burned like trash," after seeing bodies being cremated every day following the atomic bombing, Wada said that "we must not create any more global hibakusha."

Convened pursuant to a U.N. General Assembly resolution, the conference was co-chaired by Kazakhstan and Kiribati and attended by many other countries affected by nuclear tests, including the Marshall Islands. Only a few nuclear-armed states, including Russia and China, were among the participants.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]