Japan Marks 69th Anniversay of Hiroshima Bombing(Aug 06,1945 - Aug 06,2014)

The Enola Gay dropped the Hiroshima bomb on August 6, 1945

 Hiroshima after the dropping of the atom bomb in August 1945

The bomb killed 160,000 people and left Hiroshima in ruins

Japan marked the 69th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima on Wednesday Aug 06,2014, as Mayor Kazumi Matsui called on U.S. President Barack Obama and other world leaders to visit the city to see the scars of the atomic bombing first hand.

In his "peace declaration" speech, Matsui invited world leaders to his once-devastated hometown, referring to a proposal made at a ministerial meeting in April of the Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Initiative in Hiroshima, urging them to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki

About 45,000 people stood for a minute of silence at the ceremony in Hiroshima's peace park near the epicenter of the 1945 attack that killed up to 140,000 people. A second bombing, over Nagasaki three days later, killed another 70,000, prompting Japan's surrender in World War II.

The number of surviving victims, known as "hibakusha," was just more than 190,000 this year. Their average age is 79, and many of the attendants at the ceremony were their younger relatives and descendants. 

Hiroshima officials said 5,507 survivors died over the past year.