Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan vowed today to challenge the "myth of safety" of nuclear power while marking the 66th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
Mr Kan, speaking at a ceremony devoted to the victims of the bomb that killed more than 100,000, repeated that the meltdowns at the Fukushima plant after a March earthquake convinced him Japan should aim to end its dependence on nuclear power.
"I will deeply reflect on nuclear power's 'myth of safety', investigate thoroughly the causes of the accident and fundamental measures to secure safety, as well as reduce the dependence on nuclear power plants and aim for a 'society that does not depend on nuclear power plants," he said.
The anniversary was marked in Ireland by a commemoration at Merrion Square in Dublin attending by Japanese ambassador to Ireland, Chihiro Atsumi, and Dublin Lord Mayor Andrew Montague.
Hiroshima, just like Japan as a whole, had been careful not to let the wartime trauma influence the debate about the merits of nuclear energy and the nation's passionate rejection of nuclear weapons has been separated from its attitudes to nuclear industry.
But its mayor's plea for a revamp of the nation's energy policy at such a symbolic place and time may signal that this is changing.
Kazumi Matsui, a son of an atomic bomb survivor, said the Fukushima crisis has traumatised the public and Tokyo needed to act to regain public trust.
"The Japanese government should sincerely accept this reality and review its energy policy quickly," he said during a ceremony held to mark the US that the B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped the atomic bomb on the city on August 6th, 1945.
It was the first time in decades that any Hiroshima mayor has questioned Japan's decades-long policy of developing nuclear power during the annual ceremony.
Mr Matsui said it was heartbreaking to see the devastation left by the March 11th earthquake and tsunami and how it resembled what was left of Hiroshima after the bombing.
This western industrial city of 1.2 million every year honours thousands who perished in the attack and many more who died of radiation exposure observing a minute of silence, tolling a peace bell and releasing hundreds of doves into the air.
The bomb, nicknamed "Little Boy", released a mix of shockwaves, heat rays and radiation. The death toll by the end of 1945 was estimated at about 140,000 out of the total 350,000 that lived there at the time.
Three days after the attack on Hiroshima, the US dropped a second atomic bomb on the southern city of Nagasaki. Japan surrendered six days later.
Japan, the only country to suffer atomic bombs, has a self-imposed ban against nuclear arms, part of its pacifist post-war constitution.
Reuters