News Headlines

On March 17, Yenny Wahid, director of the Wahid Foundation and daughter of late Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid, met with Soka Gakkai Senior Vice President Hiromasa Ikeda at the Soka Gakkai Headquarters in Tokyo. During their discussion, Ms. Wahid emphasized the importance of interfaith dialogue in transcending religious differences.

She was then received by SGI Women’s Leader Yumiko Kasanuki, SGI Young Women’s Leader Hiroko Ogushi, and Masami Nasu, women’s division leader of the organization in Japan, at the Soka International Women’s Center where she gave a lecture on interfaith dialogue and women’s empowerment.

On March 18, Ms. Wahid gave the keynote speech at Soka University and Soka Women’s College’s joint graduation ceremony.

On March 8, Korea SGI (KSGI) opened a new center in Busan’s Yeonje District. The opening ceremony was attended by SGI General Director Yoshiki Tanigawa, KSGI leaders and some 1,500 members. The event was also livestreamed to 26 venues across the city and neighboring areas.

From March 7 to 9, the World Bosai Forum 2025 was held at the Sendai International Center in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The forum is a biennial event on disaster risk reduction. On March 7, Nobuyuki Asai, director for Sustainable Development and Humanitarian Affairs of the SGI, and Harumi Endo, program coordinator for Sustainable Development and Humanitarian Affairs of the SGI, delivered a presentation highlighting the importance of collaborating with local communities to effectively implement early warning systems.

On March 8, the 2025 Sendai Symposium for Disaster Risk Reduction and the Future took place at the same venue to share lessons learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. The Soka Gakkai in the Tohoku region organized a breakout session in which panelists discussed past achievements and future challenges, with a particular focus on mutual assistance, in light of the 10th anniversary of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

From March 3 to 7, an SGI (Soka Gakkai International) delegation led by Tomohiko Aishima, executive director for Peace and Global Issues of the SGI, participated in the Third Meeting of States Parties (3MSP) to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) at the UN Headquarters in New York.   

On March 3, the SGI co-organized a side event alongside the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the UN and the Center for International Security and Policy (CISP). The event featured the screening of the full 40-minute version of the documentary “I Want To Live On: The Untold Stories of the Polygon.” Created by CISP with support from the SGI, the film features survivor testimonies from Kazakhstan’s Semipalatinsk nuclear test site.

On March 6, the SGI co-organized another side event titled “Youth Voices for a Sustainable, Nuclear Weapons-Free Future” to present the provisional results of the Youth Peace Awareness Survey, which was conducted by the SGI and other organizations to gauge youth perspectives on nuclear abolition in Australia, Japan, Kazakhstan, the Marshall Islands and the US. Daiki Nakazawa and Yuki Nihei, university students of the SGI delegation, joined panel discussions with other youth representatives.    

On March 4, youth members of the SGI delegation attended the Youth MSP 2025, organized by Youth for TPNW. Miyuki Horiguchi, program coordinator for disarmament of the SGI, shared the SGI’s work for nuclear abolition during a panel discussion.

On March 5, an interfaith statement, endorsed by 107 organizations including the SGI, was delivered. The SGI also submitted a working paper on disarmament education in collaboration with the Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies at Cornell University. On March 6, Mohamed Ambrosini of the SGI Office for UN Affairs delivered the SGI’s statement, which was drafted based on the working paper.