Six-year-old Ginkgo biloba saplings will be planted in their new home as the City of Cockburn hosts its first United Nations International Day of Peace event on 21 September.
The trees, raised from a seed harvested from a Ginkgo biloba that survived the WW2 bombing of Hiroshima 75 years ago, will be planted by Cockburn Mayor Logan Howlett, at a public event attended by local school students at Yandi Park, Cockburn Central at 2pm.
The parent Ginkgo biloba was 500m from the blast epicentre in Hiroshima. That tree was destroyed but it regrew and seeds have been collected from it ever since for global distribution for occasions such as these.
Raised by the City of South Perth at its nursery, the deciduous trees commonly known as the Maidenhair tree due to its fern-like leaves, were donated to Cockburn by fellow Mayors for Peace member the City of Fremantle which was gifted several seeds by the Hiroshima chapter of Mayors for Peace in 2014.
The UN General Assembly established International Day of Peace in 1981, and in 2001 unanimously voted to designate the day a period of non-violence and cease-fire, devoted to strengthening the ideals of peace.
This year, the UN will celebrate the day by spreading compassion, kindness and hope in the face of the pandemic, and by standing together against attempts to use the virus to promote discrimination or hatred.
In 2011, Cockburn Council endorsed Mayor Howlett’s request to join the Mayors for Peace organisation, with its membership pledge stating the City’s support for the abolition of nuclear weapons.
Last year Mayor Howlett signed the ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) Cities Appeal on behalf of the City of Cockburn.
This is a global call from cities and towns in support of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons adopted by the United Nations in 2017, and other supportive cities include Sydney, Melbourne, Paris, Washington DC and Berlin.
The Treaty has the support of 122 countries, but Australia has not yet joined the Treaty.