Komeito asks Kishida to hold G-7 summit in Hiroshima

Jiji Press

17:43 JST, May 19, 2022

TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Natsuo Yamaguchi, head of Komeito, the coalition partner of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, asked Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Wednesday to hold next year’s Group of Seven summit in Hiroshima.

Yamaguchi also asked Kishida, president of the LDP, to hold a meeting of the G-7 foreign ministers in Nagasaki next year, when Japan will hold the G-7’s rotating presidency.

“I will consider the request,” Kishida said in a meeting with Yamaguchi at the Prime Minister’s Office.

Kishida has made the realization of a world without nuclear weapons as his lifework.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were devastated by U.S. atomic bombings in August 1945 in the closing days of World War II.

Yamaguchi made the request in a proposal urging the government to take concrete action to prevent nuclear powers from using nuclear weapons.

In the meeting, Yamaguchi said that Japan should lead the international community by ratifying the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, asking Kishida to win the understanding of U.S. President Joe Biden during his visit to Japan starting Sunday.

“Deepening the relationship of trust between Japan and the United States will have a positive impact on other nuclear nations,” Kishida said.

Holding a G-7 summit in Hiroshima “would provide a great opportunity to boost trust and deepen mutual understanding between nuclear haves and have-nots,” Yamaguchi told reporters after the meeting.

The G-7 members are Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States plus the European Union.