On December 22, people all over the world gathered before dawn with candles to demonstrate their solidarity against nuclear testing, war and pollution.
In Hong Kong, a group of anti-nuclear protesters also lit candles at dawn in a vigil for peace.
More than 20 million people have died in genocides and war since 1945. Cambodia, Mozambique, the Sudan, Bosnia and Angola . . . the list goes on.
Last year saw many setbacks for world peace including the resumption of nuclear testing by France and China, the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and continuing war and bloodshed in Bosnia.
The candle-lit vigil in Hong Kong was to mark the end of a year of protests against nuclear testing and nuclear weapons, which threaten world peace and the environment.
Ironically, 1995 was also the 50th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and we should have learnt our lesson by now. Instead, far from shrinking, the number of nuclear powers continues to grow, as does the power of the weapons. Since 1945, this planet has been ravaged by more than 2,036 nuclear bomb explosions.
