The 2024 Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to the Japanese organization Nihon Hidankyo for its fight against nuclear weapons

The committee has decided to honor the Japanese movement that unites the survivors of the atomic bombs dropped by the United States on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.


The 2024 Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to the Japanese organization Nihon Hidankyo for its fight against nuclear weapons


The Japanese organization Nihon Hidankyo was named the recipient of the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize, announced on Friday, October 11, by the Nobel Institute in Oslo. The movement, which brings together survivors of the atomic bombs dropped by the United States on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, was recognized for its efforts to demonstrate "that nuclear weapons should never be used again." "It is very concerning that today the taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure," the committee also wrote in the press release announcing the award.

"It has been said that thanks to nuclear weapons, peace has been maintained around the world. But nuclear weapons can be used by terrorists. For example, if Russia uses them against Ukraine, and Israel against Gaza, it won’t stop there. Political leaders must be aware of this," said Toshiyuki Mimaki, co-chairman of Nihon Hidankyo, to the press. The group also drew a parallel with the Middle East conflict, suggesting that the situation in Gaza is "like Japan eighty years ago."

This Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Nihon Hidankyo comes at a time when Moscow has repeatedly threatened to use nuclear weapons to deter the West from providing military aid to Ukraine, which has been trying for two and a half years to repel the Russian invasion that began in February 2022. In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin changed Russia's nuclear weapon use doctrine, stating that it could be employed in case of a "massive launch" of airstrikes against his country.

Next year will also mark the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the first two nuclear bombings in history, which resulted in a total of about 214,000 deaths and hastened Japan's surrender, as well as the end of World War II.


Between 2009 and 2023, the number of armed conflicts nearly doubled

More broadly, the prize was awarded against a backdrop of numerous crises: wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, famine in Sudan, and the ever-present climate threat. According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, there were 59 armed conflicts worldwide in 2023, nearly double the number in 2009. While some experts saw this as a reason not to award a Peace Prize this year, as has been done 19 times in its history, the Norwegian Nobel Committee believes that such a context makes the award "perhaps more important than ever."

"It's hard to be optimistic when you look at the world today. Peace efforts do not seem to be on the offensive," Nobel Committee Secretary Olav Njølstad had said to Agence France-Presse before the prize was awarded. "But (...) there are undoubtedly people and organizations doing excellent work," he emphasized.

Last year, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi, who is imprisoned in her country for her fight against mandatory veiling for women and against the death penalty.

This year, the Medicine Prize was awarded to Americans Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun for their discovery of microRNA, a new class of tiny RNA molecules, while the Physics Prize recognized British-Canadian Geoffrey Hinton and American John Hopfield, who, while working on "machine learning" critical to the development of AI, have raised alarms about this technology, which they believe could become uncontrollable.

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to American David Baker and a duo consisting of another American, John Jumper, and Briton Demis Hassabis, for uncovering the secrets of proteins using AI and computing.

The only female and non-Western presence so far, South Korean author Han Kang was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. As for the Economics Prize, which was added to the original Nobel Prizes in 1969, it will conclude the series on Monday, October 14.


A frequently awarded confederation

Although Toshiyuki Mimaki, one of the three co-chairs of Nihon Hidankyo, shed a few tears of joy at Hiroshima City Hall upon hearing the Nobel Peace Prize announcement, the confederation is far from unknown. It has already received the Social Activism Prize in 2010 (World Summit of Nobel Peace Prize Laureates) and has been nominated several times (1985, 1994, 2015) for the Nobel Peace Prize by the International Peace Bureau.

The confederation advocates for preventing nuclear war and the elimination of nuclear weapons, including the A-bomb and H-bomb, calling for an international agreement to completely ban and eliminate these weapons. This message has been persistently conveyed since 1956 to Japanese authorities and, more importantly, to countries around the world. Nihon Hidankyo sends numerous envoys to other nations, calling for the prevention of nuclear war and the abolition of nuclear weapons. These efforts aim to inform populations and authorities globally about the damage caused by the atomic bomb, contributing to the peace movement's development.


Actions to denounce nuclear use

The demands come at a fitting time. Nobel Committee Chairman Jørgen Watne Frydnes deemed it "alarming" this Friday that the "taboo against the use of nuclear weapons" is "under pressure." "No nuclear weapon has been used in a war for nearly 80 years," he noted. "It is therefore alarming to see that today this taboo against the use of nuclear weapons is under pressure," he added, as nuclear weapons are now part of the discourse surrounding the war in Ukraine.

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