Wednesday, August 5, 2020

BALTIMORE HOLDS 36th ANNUAL HIROSHIMA COMMEMORATION.

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HIROSHIMA-NAGASAKI COMMEMORATION COMMITTEE, 431 Notre Dame Lane, Apt. 206., Baltimore, MD 21212 Ph: 410-323-1607 Email: mobuszewski2001 [at] Comcast dot net

PRESS RELEASE-FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 5,2020

CONTACT: Max Obuszewski 410-323-1607 or 443-761-5899 or mobuszewski2001 at comcast.net

                        Janice Sevre-Duszynska 859-684-4247

BALTIMORE HOLDS 36th ANNUAL HIROSHIMA COMMEMORATION.

WHO:   For the 36th year, the Hiroshima-Nagasaki Commemoration Committee will remember the atomic bombings of Japan on August 6 & 9, 1945, which killed hundreds of thousands of people.  Other organizations involved in the commemorations are the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, Baltimore Peace Action, Chesapeake Physicians for Social Responsibility, Homewood Friends Meeting, Maryland Peace Action and Prevent Nuclear War/Maryland.

WHAT/WHEN/WHERE: On Thursday, August 6 from 1:15 to 1:30 PM, as part of the 75 Years of shared Nuclear Legacy, four advocates will speak out against Johns Hopkins University’s weapons research.  From 1:30 to 1:45 PM, listen to Councilperson Bill Henry and others talk about the Back from the Brink campaign.  Baltimore was the first major city to pass a resolution supporting this campaign. To watch these segments and many others on both August 6 and 9, go to https://www.hiroshimanagasaki75.org/events?emci=cc643ffc-2dd0-ea11-9b05-00155d03bda0&emdi=0198b95e-3bd0-ea11-9b05-00155d03bda0&ceid=130901.

  Also on August 6 from 5 to 6:30 PM with signs, banners, ribbons and artwork, participants will commemorate the atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the four corners at 33rd and North Charles Streets in Baltimore.  This area was selected because of its proximity to Johns Hopkins University, a major nuclear weapons contractor. In fiscal year 2019, JHU received more than one billion dollars in weapons contracts. JHU’s Applied Physics Laboratory is the research center which engages in most of the university’s work on weapons research. The APL renewed a seven-year contract in 2017 worth $93 million to continue a strategic partnership with the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center. The protesters will show support for the Back from the Brink resolution, five steps towards the abolition of nuclear weapons, and will call for ratification of the UN Ban Treaty.  People will wear masks and stay six feet from others. 

WHY: These are very dangerous times. The United States is planning to spend over a trillion dollars to maintain and enhance its nuclear weapons arsenal for decades to come. The Trump administration is abandoning hard-won agreements aiming to reduce chances of nuclear war. Seventy-five years later, the Doomsday Clock is at 100 seconds to midnight.  We must make sure the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are never repeated.

The U.S. and Russian governments, which possess approximately 93 percent of the world’s nearly 14,000 nuclear warheads, have abandoned negotiations.  The Trump administration is calling for more nuclear testing, and wants to develop battlefield, lower-yield nuclear weapons.  It is terrifying to think that a president can launch a nuclear strike without Congressional approval.  Can we trust President Trump who may lose the  election in November not to use nuclear weapons?     

In 2017, 122 countries voted for a United Nations Treaty to Ban Nuclear Weapons.  It takes fifty countries to ratify this Treaty, and the count is presently at 40.  Baltimore’s anti-nuclear community continues to speak out, to demonstrate and to lobby federal legislators that these awful and immoral weapons must be banned.  We want to build a safer world for the children to inherit. Let us show respect for Mother Earth by remembering what the Hibakusha, atomic bomb survivors, say -- Never Again.  As long as nuclear weapons exist, they may be used.  We must reduce the risk of nuclear war which will ultimately require the abolition of nuclear weapons. The Hiroshima-Nagasaki Commemoration Committee will continue its work to rid the planet of nuclear weapons.

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“The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to 

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