Kanagawa, Japan—UPF-Japan together with the volunteer group TANPOPO (“dandelion”), an affiliate of the Youth Federation for World Peace (YFWP), commemorated the UN International Day of Peace on September 20, 2015 by cleaning Wada Nahama Beach along the Miura peninsula in Kanagawa prefecture.
The International Day of Peace, which is observed each year on September 21, was established by the UN as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence. This year, UPF chapters in more than 35 nations held commemorative events under the Day’s 2015 theme, “Partnership for Peace-Dignity for All.”
Mr. Kazunori Arase, UPF-Japan’s director of publications, began the cleanup by saying, “Ten years since its inauguration, UPF is committed to [building a network of peacebuilders] and the vision of ‘One Family Under God’.”
The participants then collected trash, including plastic bottles and cans, strewn on the beach. Several “Peace Rangers,” YFWP’s mascot for cleaning projects, joined the activity, to the delight of the participants.
The activity was part of the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup (ICC), involving more than 500,000 volunteers around the world, and contributed to ICC’s global research study on coastal trash. After the cleanup, the litter the participants had collected was given to the Kanagawa Coastal Beautification Foundation, who analyzed and reported the contents of it to JEAN, the Japanese partner of ICC’s global research study.