Japan to not attend UN nuke ban meeting, says foreign minister

ISTANBUL

The Japanese government will not participate in the UN meeting on prohibition of nuclear weapons as an observer, the Tokyo-based Kyodo news agency reported on Tuesday.

Japan’s Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya said that Tokyo will not send an observer to attend the UN-based third nuclear prohibition meeting.

The government was urged many times to attend the meeting as this year is the 80th anniversary of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the US.

The 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki led to the deaths of approximately 210,000 people.

Japan is not a signatory of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

The UN meeting will take place on March 3-7 at the UN headquarters in New York, with Kazakhstan serving as president, according to the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs.

Earlier, Japan's atomic bomb survivors group, Nihon Hidankyo, which won the Nobel Peace Prize last year, had urged the government to attend the meeting.