"I am speaking today as mayor of Hiroshima--the first city (in the world) attacked by a nuclear weapon--to share the earnest wishes of hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors) for the elimination of nuclear weapons," Matsui said in his address at the session, which started Thursday at the UN headquarters here.

Having gone through "incredible misery," such as the sorrow of losing their beloved families and friends, and the long-term effects of radiation, hibakusha "have arrived at the unshakable conviction that 'no one shall ever again suffer as we have.'"

They have continued to "appeal for nuclear abolition and their fervent desire for peace to the people of the world," he said, stressing, "Their earnest wish is to witness the prohibition of nuclear weapons in their lifetime."

Matsui showed his gratitude for the inclusion of wording referring to hibakusha's suffering in the preamble of a draft text of the proposed nuclear weapons ban convention.

The preamble says that the nations proposing the treaty are "mindful of the suffering of the victims of the use of nuclear weapons (Hibakusha) as well as of those affected by the testing of nuclear weapons." The draft was prepared by Elayne Whyte Gomez, permanent representative at Costa Rica's mission to the United

Nations in Geneva, who chairs the UN conference.

Hiroshima, western Japan, was devastated by a US atomic bomb on Aug. 6, 1945, in the closing days of World War II. The southwestern Japan city of Nagasaki suffered the same fate three days later. (Jiji Press)