PROPOSITION ONE COMMITTEE
PO BOX 27217, WASHINGTON, DC 20038 USA
202-682-4282 (phone and fax)
prop1@prop1.org -- (e-mail) | http://prop1.org -- (World-Wide-Web)
______________________________________________________________________
March 3, 2005
Mayor Anthony Williams
1313 Pennsylvania Avenue NW 6th Floor
Washington DC 20004 |Fax: 202-727-0505
Attention: Scheduler: Chris Canning 727-1681
Dear Mayor Williams:
This year is the 60th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and there is a delegation of 50 Japanese nuclear disarmament advocates coming to Washington D.C. on April 26th, leaving for New York on April 28th to attend the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference with NGO's and Mayors from around the world who are calling for global nuclear disarmament.
Several of the Japanese visitors will be Hibakusha, aging atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We hope you will greet these people at a reception to be held the evening of April 27th, probably at St. Stephen's Church, 16th St. and Park Rd NW.
We hope you will join the hundreds of Mayors around the world who are educating their constitutents and signing the Mayors' Statement calling for global elimination of nuclear weapons. (See http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/mayors/english/campaign/2020vision.html) We hope you too will go to New York, especially during the first three days in May, with Mayors for Peace, and register your concern about the threat nuclear weapons pose to our city, the most likely to be attacked in the U.S. in the event of nuclear war. We have a DVD about Mayors for Peace that we would like to share with you.
Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba of Hiroshima, President of "2020 Vision Campaign For Peace", spoke to the U.S. Council of Mayors here in D.C. on January 17th. Here is the Mayors For Peace report:
U.S. Conference of Mayors embraces Mayor Akiba
Washington, DC, 17 January 2005
In a speech entitled A Non-Violent Response to the Ultimate Violence, the President of Mayors for Peace, Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba, welcomed the participation of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Emergency Campaign to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons. His speech received enthusiastic applause from his audience of over two hundred US mayors. The speech was part of a Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. commemoration that marked the beginning of the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) winter meeting in Washington DC, 17-19 January. Mayor Akiba was introduced by Akron Mayor Donald Plusquellic the President of USCM who announced that the program was being broadcast live on C-SPAN TV. Citing Dr. King's abhorrence of nuclear weapons, Mayor Akiba referred to the hibakusha's 'Promised Land' of a nuclear-weapon-free world.
"Like Dr. King, they may not get to this Promised Land with us; but I, for one, am determined that at least some of them shall see the day when the whole world awakens from its nuclear trance. I ask you in the name of all our elders, who knew the many horrors of World War II. More importantly, I ask you in the name of our children and their children, whom it is our sacred duty to protect from such horrors. Please join me in pulling the world back from this abyss. Let us together do everything in our power to reach that Promised Land."
His description of how the June USCM resolution on commencing negotiations for a nuclear-weapon-free world had become the basis for an international signature drive was greeted with applause. Mayor Akiba specifically asked the USCM to support its President as he organized the US contingent of the international delegation of mayors to the 2005 NPT Review Conference. Mayors for Peace will work closely in the coming months to ensure that US mayors constitute a significant percentage of the One-Hundred-Strong Delegation. Mayor Akiba's speech can also be seen on the USCM website.
Mayors for Peace was also invited to participate in the work of the USCM's International Affairs Committee. As Mayor Akiba had to depart for Europe, Santa Paula Mayor Gabino Aguirre and International Campaign Manager Aaron Tovish made the presentation to the Committee. Chairwomen Mayor Meyera Oberndorf welcomed Mayors for Peace as "part of the family." And the cooperation between Mayors for Peace and Sister Cities International, which also made a presentation, was evident.
Over a dozen US Mayors became members on the spot, and many others took the registration form home with them to obtain approval of their city councils to join.
We hope you will join the Mayors from 100 countries around the world at the United Nations May 1-3, 2005, and that you will sign the "Mayoral Statement In Support For The Commencement Of Negotiations On The Elimination Of Nuclear Weapons" to be found at http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/mayors/english/campaign/mayoralstatement.htm
We also hope you will join the Japanese activists on April 27th. I will call your scheduler.
Your leadership on this issue will be a welcome addition to the campaign begun here in D.C. in September, 1993 when DC Voter Initiative 37 won 56% of the vote, and Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton began introducing the "Nuclear Disarmament and Economic Conversion Act" into the U.S. House of Representatives each session since 1994. She is soon to introduce it for the seventh time, and your support will be very helpful.
Sincerely,
Ellen Thomas, for
Proposition One Committee and
Hiroshima-Nagasaki Peace Committee of the Gray Panthers - National Capitol Region
202-682-4282
(No reply received.)