On the Enactment of the “Security Bills” in Japan
October 1, 2015
On 19 September, the “Bills concerning the Peace and Security of Japan and International Community” were passed by the Japanese National Diet, amid a majority of Japanese demanding their lawmakers for careful deliberations on the bills which were widely suspected to violate Japan’s war-renouncing Constitution.
Pugwash Japan members (signed below) herewith express deep concern over the intense possibility that, according to the new bills, Japan will be able, henceforth, to exercise its “right of collective self-defense”, which could go beyond the pacifist restraints of the Japanese Constitution (embodied in its Article 9), to which Japan has committed herself since the end of World War II. The government explains that the new bills will strengthen Japanese “deterrence” and thus likely to prevent the war, but history shows that the very concept of military “deterrence” leads to intensification of conflicts and rivalries among nations.
Inspired by the spirit of the “Russel-Einstein Manifesto”, which advocates the abolition of nuclear weapons and the elimination of war, we have been striving to build a peaceful world order, which is based, not on the use of force, but on the principles of dialogue and mutual understanding. We believe that, on the 70th anniversary of the end of the World War II and the tragedies at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan should renew its pledge to international community that it renounces war forever and pursues to attain its security, not by the use of force, but by peaceful means.
Bearing in mind the pacifist principle of the Article 9 (the significance of which is enhanced, not lessened, by the intensification of conflict and mistrust in international milieu) and recalling the voice of Hibakushas who continue to denounce the inhumanity of war and nuclear weapons, we are determined that we shall make every effort, in close collaboration with the civil society all over the world, to achieve new security, which will be based neither on nuclear weapons nor use of force.
Pugwash Japan Members
Yuzo Itagaki、Tomohiro Inagaki、Hiromichi Umebayashi、Masakatsu Ota、Yohsiko Kurita、Michiji Konuma、
Yoko Kobayashi、Shoji Sawada、Mayumi Sugiyama、Tatsujiro Suzuki、Masako Bando、Seigo Hirowatari、
Masakatsu Yamazaki、Hiroyuki Yoshikawa、Katsuko Kataoka、
