Sunday marks 78 years since the world's first atomic bombing over Hiroshima, Japan.

The annual ceremony will be held at the city's Peace Memorial Park. Prime Minister Kishida Fumio and representatives from about 110 countries will attend the event.

Some seats will be open to the public for the first time in four years after the lifting of coronavirus pandemic restrictions put in place during the previous three annual ceremonies.

An updated list of nearly 340,000 victims will be placed inside a cenotaph to include the names of people who survived the bombing but have died over the past 12 months.

A moment of silence will be observed at 8:15 a.m., the exact time the atomic bomb was dropped on August 6th, 1945.

The blast killed about 140,000 people by the end of that year, and exposed many others to harmful heat rays and radiation.

This year's ceremony comes just a few months after G7 leaders gathered in Hiroshima to reaffirm their commitment to achieving a world without nuclear weapons.

The G7 leaders visited the Peace Memorial Park, including its museum detailing the devastation wrought by the US attack, and were joined by their counterparts from Ukraine, Brazil, India two days later.

Some survivors say the historic event has not led to an explicit move to abolish nuclear arms, as some countries rely on the perceived nuclear deterrence for their national security.

As Russia continues its invasion of Ukraine, Moscow has repeatedly threatened to use its nuclear weapons.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said his country had begun deploying tactical nuclear weapons in neighboring ally, Belarus.

Poland responded by announcing its intention to join the deterrence policy of the NATO alliance's nuclear sharing program.

Atomic bomb survivors have been calling for world peace without nuclear weapons, not peace by nuclear deterrence.

As the number of survivors grows fewer each passing year, people in Hiroshima want to pass down the experiences of atomic bomb survivors, with hopes for the abolition of nuclear weapons for the sake of the world's future generations.