Japan's aging atomic bomb survivors speak out against nuclear weapons

HIROSHIMA, Japan (AP) — Eighty years after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, many of the remaining Japanese survivors are increasingly frustrated by growing nuclear threats and the acceptance of nuclear weapons by global leaders.

The U.S. attacks on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, and three days later on Nagasaki killed more than 200,000 people by the end of that year. Others survived but with radiation illness.

About 100,000 survivors are still alive. Many hid their experiences to protect themselves and their families from discrimination that still exists. Others couldn’t talk about what happened because of the trauma they suffered.

Some of the aging survivors have begun to speak out late in their lives, hoping to encourage others to push for the end of nuclear weapons.

Despite numerous health issues, survivor Kunihiko Iida, 83, has devoted his retirement years to telling his story as a way to advocate for nuclear disarmament.

He volunteers as a guide at Hiroshima's Peace Memorial Park. He wants to raise awareness among foreigners because he feels their understanding of the bombings is lacking.

It took him 60 years to be able to talk about his ordeal in public.

When the U.S. dropped a uranium bomb on Hiroshima, Iida was 900 meters (yards) away from the hypocenter, at a house where his mother grew up.

He was 3 years old. He remembers the intensity of the blast. It was as if he was thrown out of a building. He found himself alone underneath the debris, bleeding from shards of broken glass all over his body.

“Mommy, help!” he tried to scream, but his voice didn’t come out. Eventually he was rescued by his grandfather.

Within a month, his 25-year-old mother and 4-year-old sister died after developing nosebleeds, skin problems and fatigue. Iida had similar radiation effects through elementary school, though he gradually regained his health.

He was almost 60 when he finally visited the peace park at the hypocenter, the first time since the bombing, asked by his aging aunt to keep her company.

After he decided to start telling his story, it wasn’t easy. Overwhelmed by emotion, it took him a few years before he could speak in public.

In June, he met with students in Paris, London and Warsaw on a government-commissioned peace program. Despite his worries about how his calls for nuclear abolishment would be perceived in nuclear-armed states like Britain and France, he received applause and handshakes.

Iida says he tries to get students to imagine the aftermath of a nuclear attack, how it would destroy both sides and leave behind highly radioactive contamination.

“The only path to peace is nuclear weapons' abolishment. There is no other way,” Iida said.

Fumiko Doi, 86, would not have survived the atomic bombing on Nagasaki if a train she was on had been on time. The train was scheduled to arrive at Urakami station around 11 a.m., just when the bomb was dropped above a nearby cathedral.

With the delay, the train was 5 kilometers (3 miles) away. Through the windows, Doi, then 6, saw the flash. She covered her eyes and bent over as shards of broken windows rained down. Nearby passengers covered her for protection.

People on the street had their hair burnt. Their faces were charcoal black and their clothes were in pieces, she said.

Doi told her children of the experience in writing, but long hid her status as a survivor because of fear of discrimination.

Doi married another survivor. She worried their four children would suffer from radiation effects. Her mother and two of her three brothers died of cancer, and two sisters have struggled with their health.

Her father, a local official, was mobilized to collect bodies and soon developed radiation symptoms. He later became a teacher and described what he'd seen, his sorrow and pain in poetry, a teary Doi explained.

Doi began speaking out after seeing the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster following a strong earthquake and tsunami, which caused radioactive contamination.

She travels from her home in Fukuoka to join anti-war rallies, and speaks out against atomic weapons.

“Some people have forgotten about the atomic bombings ... That’s sad," she said, noting that some countries still possess and develop nuclear weapons more powerful than those used 80 years ago.

“If one hits Japan, we will be destroyed. If more are used around the world, that’s the end of the Earth,” she said. ”That’s why I grab every chance to speak out.”

After the 2023 Hiroshima G7 meeting of global leaders and the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the grassroots survivors’ group Nihon Hidankyo last year, visitors to Hiroshima and Nagasaki peace museums have soared, with about one third of them coming from abroad.

On a recent day, most of the visitors at the Hiroshima peace park were non-Japanese. Samantha Anne, an American, said she wanted her children to understand the bombing.

“It’s a reminder of how much devastation one decision can make,” Anne said.

Katsumi Takahashi, a 74-year-old volunteer specializing in guided walks of the area, welcomes foreign visitors but worries about Japanese youth ignoring their own history.

On his way home, Iida, the survivor and guide, stopped by a monument dedicated to the children killed. Millions of colorful paper cranes, known as the symbol of peace, hung nearby, sent from around the world.

Even a brief encounter with a survivor made the tragedy more real, Melanie Gringoire, a French visitor, said after Iida's visit. “It’s like sharing a little piece of history.”

Associated Press video journalists Mayuko Ono and Ayaka McGill contributed to this report.

Kunihio Iida, atomic bomb survivor and a volunteer guide the iconic exhibition hall best known as the Atomic Bomb Dome speaks in English to foreign visitors on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Hiroshima, western Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

Kunihio Iida, atomic bomb survivor and a volunteer guide speaks in English to foreign visitors in front of the Children's Peace Monument where the place where people offer paper cranes to honor the victims of the 1945 atomic bomb on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Hiroshima, western Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

Kunihio Iida, atomic bomb survivor and a volunteer guide speaks in English to foreign visitors at the Children's Peace Monument where the place where people offer paper cranes to honor the victims of the 1945 atomic bomb on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Hiroshima, western Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

Kunihio Iida, atomic bomb survivor and a volunteer guide the iconic exhibition hall best known as the Atomic Bomb Dome speaks in English to foreign visitors on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Hiroshima, western Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

Kunihio Iida, atomic bomb survivor and a volunteer guide speaks in English to foreign visitors looks app the sky in front of the Children's Peace Monument where the place where people offer paper cranes to honor the victims of the 1945 atomic bomb on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, in Hiroshima, western Japan. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — UConn starting guard Solo Ball limped from room to room Sunday at Lucas Oil Stadium, a protective boot on his sprained left foot. Michigan forward Yaxel Lendeborg didn't even do that much because of an injured left ankle and an injured left knee.

Just one day before the teams meet in Monday night's national championship game, the big question for both was the health of two key playmakers.

Neither was expected to practice Sunday as they focused instead on getting as much treatment as possible, even as teammates and the players themselves insisted the stars would play Monday night. The coaches, Dan Hurley and Dusty May, also tried to lighten the mood before college basketball's biggest game of the season.

“I’m sure he’ll give it a go tomorrow, but that will be entirely up to him and the medical staff,” May said as he updated the playing status of Lendeborg, a first team All-American. “He’ll tell me if he can go and we were laughing because he played the second half, but he played the second half like a 38-year-old at the YMCA — a really good 38-year-old at the YMCA. So whatever version we get of Yaxel we get, it’s going to be somebody that helps us play better basketball.”

Lendeborg played just five minutes of the first half before getting hurt in Saturday's 91-73 victory over Arizona, which sent Michigan (36-3) to its first title game since 2018. He finished with 11 points and three rebounds in 15 minutes and made two 3-pointers in the second half.

But he hardly resembled the guy who was named the Big Ten's Player of the Year.

When Lendeborg was asked whether missing Monday night's game was a possibility, Lendeborg emphatically told reporters in the locker room, “absolutely not.” He reinjured the ankle he initially hurt in the Big Ten Tournament championship game. The knee injury was a new one and Lendeborg said, at worst, he was told it was a sprained medial collateral ligament. May said MRI results came back clean Sunday.

Still, the combination prevented him from doing the traditional between-games media circuit.

While everyone saw Lendeborg's injury Saturday's, Ball's injury seemed to surprise everyone including Hurley, who said he saw Ball in a walking boot before being told what happened.

Ball has played a key role in helping UConn (34-5) reach its third title game in four years, averaging 12.9 points and starting all 38 games he appeared in this season.

He scored 10 of his 13 points in the second half of Saturday’s 91-72 victory over Illinois — after getting hurt in the first half — and told reporters played through the injury on pure adrenaline. The injury occurred when Ball and teammate Tarris Reed Jr. got tangled.

“I've just been doing everything I can to take care of it,” Ball said Sunday. “It's just a bump in the road, so you've got to keep moving forward. Pain is temporary. People say it pushes you through your toughest performance, so it's only what you're made of. This is the championship game.”

Hurley had other questions, though, as UConn attempts to win its third national championship in four years and the seventh in school history. The Huskies are tied with North Carolina for the third-highest total of national championships, behind UCLA (11) and Kentucky (eight).

UConn has won all six of its titles since 1999 and remains hopeful Ball will be a go on Monday.

“I think we’ll see whether this turns into — it’s going to be tough to get an MRI on Easter, on a Sunday,” Hurley said. “I don’t know what the hospitals are like in Indiana. Hospitals stay open.”

Michigan, apparently, had already resolved that issue.

But the Wolverines don't expect Lendeborg's injury to change their mission, snapping a four-game losing streak in NCAA Tournament title games and capturing the school's first national title since 1989 and the second in program history. Nor do they expect it to change their game plan.

“I'll still play the four outs,” Michigan forward Morez Johnson Jr. said. “And Yax is fine.”

AP March Madness bracket: https://apnews.com/hub/ncaa-mens-bracket and coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness

Michigan forward Yaxel Lendeborg (23) falls after play against Arizona during the first half of an NCAA college basketball tournament semifinal game at the Final Four, Saturday, April 4, 2026, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

UConn guard Solo Ball (1) celebrates his basket as Illinois guard Andrej Stojakovic (2) looks on during the second half of an NCAA college basketball tournament semifinal game at the Final Four, Saturday, April 4, 2026, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Michigan forward Yaxel Lendeborg reacts after an injury on the court during the first half of an NCAA college basketball tournament semifinal game against Arizona at the Final Four, Saturday, April 4, 2026, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

UConn's Solo Ball (1) dunks as Illinois' Andrej Stojakovic, left, watches during the second half of an NCAA college basketball tournament semifinal game at the Final Four, Saturday, April 4, 2026, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)