Kyuma earned ouster: A-bomb survivors

HIROSHIMA (Kyodo) Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma deserved to resign, considering the anger sparked by his remarks suggesting the 1945 U.S. atomic bombings of Japan were inevitable, survivors said Tuesday.

Nagasaki Mayor Tomihisa Taue responds to reporters Tuesday at the Prime Minister's Official Residence after hearing of Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma's resignation. KYODO PHOTO

Some meanwhile said Kyuma's exit was too late in coming and was only aimed at avoiding further flak from the opposition camp against the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, to which Kyuma belongs, ahead of the July 29 House of Councilors election.

"I cannot forgive such remarks, when survivors like us are alive and suffering even now," said Hiroko Hatakeyama, 68, deputy secretary general of an atomic bomb survivor group in Hiroshima Prefecture.

"It was wrong to appoint such a person as a minister, and I believe he deserves to resign," she said, also criticizing Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for trying to take Kyuma's side.

Senji Yamaguchi, an atomic bomb survivor living in Nagasaki Prefecture, said, "I think he resigned because the opposition parties have stepped up their criticism and (LDP members fear) they may be defeated in the Upper House election.

"I wonder whether the voices of the atomic bomb survivors have truly reached and led the minister to resign," said Yamaguchi, chairman of the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations.

In Tokyo, Nagasaki Mayor Tomihisa Taue, who paid a visit to Kyuma earlier in the day to lodge a protest with him, was shocked by the resignation.

"I'm very surprised. Even after his resignation, I would like him to work for the abolishment of nuclear weapons as a Diet member from a prefecture that suffered an atomic bombing," he said.

In a speech Saturday, Kyuma said: "I understand the bombing brought the war to its end. I think it was something that couldn't be helped."

His remarks sparked protests from atomic bomb survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Kyuma, who is from Nagasaki, apologized for and retracted the remarks both Sunday and Monday.

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