FUKUOKA, April 26 — A symbolic flame kept alive since the aftermath of the 1945 US atomic bombing of Hiroshima will be installed at a memorial in Pearl Harbour in Hawaii, at a ceremony next month, a family member of an iconic atomic-bomb victim recently revealed, Kyodo News reported. 

The plan to split the “flame of peace” and bring it to a site related to the 1941 Pearl Harbour attack was proposed by the kin of Sadako Sasaki in a bid to foster lasting peace between Japan and the United States. Sasaki died at age 12 of radiation-induced leukaemia a decade after the atomic bombing of the western Japan city.

The flame will be transported in a special container on a Japan Airlines Co. aircraft, marking the first time in history that a member of the public has transported a flame in this way. The only other time the airline has transported a flame was for the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The ceremony is scheduled to be held on May 24, with participants including descendants of former US President Harry Truman, who ordered the atomic bombings of Japan, and wartime Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo.

The “flame of peace,” which has been kept alive in Yame, Fukuoka Prefecture, is said to have been taken by Tatsuo Yamamoto from the smouldering ruins of Hiroshima.

Yamamoto, who died in 2004 at the age of 88, had kept the flame burning in his home before it was moved to a peace tower in Yame in 1968.

Around five years ago, Sasaki’s nephew, Yuji Sasaki, learned about the “flame of peace” and put in motion the plan to take it to Pearl Harbour.

“This will be a significant opportunity to resolve issues between Japan and the United States,” said Masahiro Sasaki, the older brother of Sadako and himself an atomic bomb survivor.

The story of Sadako, who folded around 1,000 paper cranes in the hope of recovering from her illness — as a Japanese legend has it that a wish will be granted by folding that many cranes — inspired numerous movements and projects about peace. — Bernama-Kyodo