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On April 8, 2019, Seiko Takase, Representative Director, and Masanori Katsura, Director, left Narita International Airport, to visit Bosnia-Herzegovia until April 15. April 10 Takase and Katsura together with Nozomi Miyanoya, lecturer at University of Sarajevo and Lamija Mršo, interpreter, visited Saburina Elementary School and gave a talk in front of senior grade students, who are very tall compared to high school students in Japan. The audience including the school principal eagerly asked questions. We brought Japanese spinning tops as gift made by a hearing-impaired Japanese person. The gifts were well received. We all prayed for peace by ringing the Peace Bell. April 11 We visited the War Childhood Museum, where we learned the hardships that children experienced and how they felt during the war. Our heart hurt very much. The fact that there exists such a museum that conveys to younger generations the horrors of war is very important. April 12　Presentation Ceremony of Peace Bell  We visited City Hall and greeted Deputy Mayor of Sarajevo Milan Trivić and Ambassador Hideyuki Sakamoto. Then we were interviewed by media. The presentation ceremony of the peace bell took place at 1 pm in a very nice room of the City Hall. Attendees were about 30 people from Sarajevo City including Vice Mayor and Parliamentary Chair. Seiko Takase explained the purpose of the gift and Chiyoji Nakagawa’s aspiration about the Peace Bell. Ambasador Hideyuki Sakamoto gave a greeting address. Deputy Mayor of Sarajevo Milan Trivić expressed words of thanks. Then Deputy Mayor rang the Peace Bell, followed by Ambassador Sakamoto and rest of the attendees. The sound of the Peace Bell echoed throughout the hall. Everyone donated coins. Deputy Mayor gave us commemorative medal of Sarayjevo as a remembrance of the occasion. Nozomi Miyanoya, Lecturer, Japanese Language Course, University of Sarajevo, was instrumental for our visit and invited us to give a talk for her students in the evening. The students understood speech in Japanese. They raised many questions and the interraction was very enjoyable. Miyanoya-sensei kindly offered to translate the book “The Story of the UN Peace Bell” into Bosanski jezik.

On September 21, 2018, the UN Peace Bell Ringing Ceremony was held at the United Nations Headquarters. Mr. António Guterres, Secretary-General, and H.E. María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés, UN General Assembly chairman, gave speech and rung the bell in front of Mr.koro Bessho, Japanese ambassador to the UN, Mr. Michael Douglas, UN Peace Ambassador, representatives from nations and the five Japanese delegates: Ms. Seiko Takase, representative director of Association for the Preservation of UN Peace Bell, Mr. Kazuaki Tanaka, director, Mr. Masanori Katsura, director, Mr. Yoshimasa Kadota, member, and Ms. Kaiho Tanaka, member.

After the ceremony was ended and the dignitaries were to leave, three people, i.e. Mr. Guterres and H.E. Espinosa with a smile, together with Mr. Bessho, approached Ms. Takase unexpectedly and shook hands with her.

That was realized by the thoughtful people at the Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations led by Mr. Bessho, the UN mission Ambassador. The visit turned out to be a very memorable one.

 

On July 11, 2017, a ceremony to present Peace Bells to Myanmar was held in Naypyidaw, the capital. Ms. Seiko Takase, representative director, Mr. Masanori Kasura, director, and four people who provided us with support locally, total 6 of us, attended the ceremony.

On Myanmar side, Mr. Thura U ung Ko, Minister of Religious Affairs and Culture, and government officials, total 80 or so, were present at the ceremony.

We wished to see the three peace bells installed in the following three locations.

1^st bell – Diet or premise of equivalent significance,

2^nd bell – Pagoda, and

3^rd bell – Japan Cemetery

Myanmar is the place where Chiyoji fought the severe war, lost his soldiers and was the only survivor in his unit, hence hardened his resolution “No More Wars.”

Chiyoji’s peace bell movement started here, and resulted in presenting the peace bell to the United Nations.

 

 

The gold letters on the bell 「世界絶対平和萬歳」 (literal translation is “World’s Absolute Peace for Ten thousand Years”) represent Chiyoji Nakagawa’s intense desire. The gold letters faded away after many years, and we launnched a project to repair it. The projec was undertaken by Oigo Ltd., and a crafsman visited to New York from Japan.