Residents in Okinawa Prefecture renewed their pledge for peace at an annual memorial service for those who died in the Battle of Okinawa, on the 75th anniversary on Tuesday of the end of the fierce ground battle in the final phase of World War II.

During the memorial service, sponsored by the Okinawa prefectural government and held in the Peace Memorial Park in the Mabuni district in Itoman, Okinawa, participants observed a minute of silence for the war dead from noon (3 a.m. GMT). Mabuni was the last grueling battlefield during the Battle of Okinawa.

The number of participants at the ceremony was reduced sharply to 200 from 5,000 in usual years and seats were arranged with some distance from each other as part of measures to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.

At the ceremony, Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki read out a peace declaration.

Tamaki urged the world to share "the heart of Okinawa" of handing down lessons learned from the Battle of Okinawa correctly to the next generations and aspiring for peace, in order not to allow memories of war to be forgotten.

"Gathering the wisdom of the human beings, we must move forward to abolish nuclear weapons, abandon war and establish eternal peace," he said.

Tamaki also referred to the central government's plan to relocate the US Marine Corps' Futenma air station in Ginowan, Okinawa, to the Henoko coastal district in Nago, another city in the southernmost Japan prefecture.

"It's important that our generations living now think about the issue with responsibility in order to leave the rich natural environment of the sea and forests to the next generations," Tamaki said.

Tamaki opposes the relocation plan and calls for the Futenma base to be moved out of the prefecture.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe did not attend the ceremony as part of measures to prevent the spread of the virus. Instead, he sent a video message to the event.

Abe said in the video message that he "cannot tolerate at all" the concentration of US bases in Okinawa.

"To reduce the base-hosting burden of Okinawa, I'm determined to produce results steadily, one by one," Abe said.

The mayors of the atom-bombed cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki also sent video messages to the ceremony, appealing for unity to keep world peace.

Akane Takara, a 17-year-old third-grade student at Shuri prefectural high school, read out an own poem for peace.

Voicing gratitude to those who survived the war, Takara pledged efforts to keep peace.

US forces landed on Okinawa in April 1945. Many Okinawa residents were caught up in the largest ground battle on Japanese soil during World War II, which left over 200,000 troops and civilians dead.

This year, the names of 30 victims were inscribed on the Cornerstone of Peace, a monument in the Itoman park to commemorate those who died in the battle, bringing the total number of inscribed names to 241,593.

JIJI Press