Subject: Japanese Delegation Addresses City Council: Support Kobe
From: Carrie Lybecker
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2006

About 80 people attended last night's city council meeting at which a visiting 
delegation of Japanese peace activists thanked Olympia for opposing nuclear war 
and proliferation by declaring Olympia a nuclear free zone. If you weren't there, 
catch the rerun on TCTV. It was an historic moment.

Four delegates gave prepared remarks to the council. One speaker began working as 
a news reporter in Nagasaki 10 years after the bombings. He said they have been 
following our NFZ saga closely by watching our city council meetings via streaming 
video over the net! They've downloaded the text of resolutions, the ordinance etc, 
translated documents into Japanese, and distributed to others throughout Japan.

He also passed out a citizen-generated newsletter--8 pages, in English no less--from 
the Hyogo Peace Committee.

It talks about the city of Kobe (Kobe is the capitol city in Hyogo prefecture) which 
has one of the world's leading ports. Apparently following WWII, Kobe Port was occupied 
by the US military which subsequently used it to support war efforts in Korea and then 
Vietnam. In that latter war, Kobe responded by shipping support goods to the Vietnamese 
people, and port workers and citizens staged protests against US bases.

Then in 1975 Kobe declared itself a nuclear free port in what came to be known and widely 
emulated as the "Kobe Formula" or "Kobe Hoshiki." It bans port entry to any ship armed 
with nuclear weapons and requires ships from any nation to submit certification that they 
are not carrying nuclear weapons. Since then, all nations seeking port entry have 
submitted the required certification, except one--yeppers, the United States. Therefore 
no US military vessel has entered Kobe Port since 1975.

In 1995, Kobe was hit by a devastating earthquake that destroyed 135,000 homes and killed 
6,000 people. The US government offered relief--if delivered by a nuclear aircraft carrier. 
Citizens of Kobe staged major protests and its nuclear free zone held.

Today, the Kobe Formula is under attack as the US seeks to expand its military bases in 
Japan and demands that Kobe, the only nuclear-free port in Japan, allow nuclear vessels 
into its port.

"We are determined to keep our nuclear-free Kobe Formula. We shall do it in solidarity 
with all the anti-bases campaigns across Japan. We shall do it in solidarity with all the 
anti-nuclear movements in the world. Let's share our experiences and exchange information 
about our activities."

And then the Japanese delegation thanked us profusely for all our efforts and repeatedly 
said those efforts have been very encouraging to them. As you can imagine, this was a 
pretty humbling experience.

Support Kobe.

Carrie

PS Judging from today's paper, I think The Olympian is missing what may become a major 
story. Just my opinion.