Hiroshima should be the 'start of our moral awakening,' Obama says

U.S. President Barack Obama said he hopes Hiroshima and Nagasaki will not be seen as the dawn of the atomic warfare but as the "start of our own moral awakening" as he called for reducing global stockpiles of nuclear weapons. 

Speaking at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park alongside Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Obama said the memory of Aug. 6, 1945, the day the U.S. dropped the atomic bomb on the western Japanese city, "must never fade."

"Death fell from the sky and the world was changed," Obama said, after laying a wreath as a tribute to the 140,000 killed that day. 

Obama, who has become the first sitting U.S. president to visit Hiroshima, said the bombing "demonstrated that mankind possessed the means to destroy itself."

Barack Obama hugs Shigeaki Mori, a survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Credit: JOHANNES EISELE/AFP/Getty Images

Barack Obama delivers remarks after laying a wreath at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Credit: JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images

His speech carefully stopped short of apologising for the bomb attack, offering instead a reflection on the horrors of war. "We stand here in the middle of this city and force ourselves to imagine the moment the bomb fell ... we listen to a silent cry." Obama said.

Calling for the world to get rid of nuclear stockpiles, Obama, who was awarded a Nobel Peace prize for his anti-nuclear agenda, said the humanity is not "bound by genetic code to repeat the mistakes of the past." 

"We must have the courage to escape the logic of fear and pursue a world without them," Obama said of nuclear weapons.

He hailed a future in which Hiroshima and Nagasaki "are not known as the dawn of atomic warfare, but as the start of our own moral awakening." 

The Associated Press contributed reporting.

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