Japan's most renowned living writer, Mr. Haruki Murakami, received the Premi Internacional Catalunya prize in Barcelona on June 9 from the Catalan Government, and took the occasion to criticize Japan's nuclear policies.
Japan can be proud that Mr. Murakami received a prize that has gone to such prestigious recipients as Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss, French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau and Indian Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen.
Japan should be proud that a well-known Japanese writer has spoken out, clearly and firmly, on an issue of urgent importance.