DU pollution as a stealth weapon
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- Nato obstructs UN inquiry into depleted
uranium
- By Robert Fisk, Independent (London), 16
October 1999. Nato has refused to co-operate with a UN team
investigating the use of the munitions in the former
Yugoslavia. Hundreds of tons of DU were used in the 1991
Gulf War and in the years that followed, there was an
epidemic of cancers among Iraqis living near the
battlefields many of whom showed symptoms identical or
similar to thousands of Allied veterans now suffering from
Gulf War syndrome.
- Kosovo: Use of depleted uranium
- By Rosalie Bertell, 31 March 1999. Depleted (DU) uranium
is highly toxic to humans, both chemically as a heavy metal
and radiologically as an alpha particle emitter. It is
most likely a major contributor to the Gulf War
Syndrome. Penegrading tank armor, it realeases a deadly
ceramic aerosol of uranium. It can travel in air tens of
kilometres from the point of release. Alpha irradiation,
emphysema and/or fibrosis, damage to the gastro-intestinal
tract, damage the immune systemm and initiate or promote
cancers.
- Conflict in the Balkans: Not such
conventional weapons
- By Christine Abdelkrim-Delanne, Le
Monde diplomatique, June 1999. During the Gulf war
the Allied forces, particularly the U.S. and the U.K.,
used ammunition made from depleted uranium for the first
time (shells, missiles, bombs and bullets). These
munitions have now been used by Nato in Yugoslavia. Apart
from their immediate effects, they have dramatic long-term
effects on their victimsand also on their
usersthrough radioactive contamination.
- Depleted uranium: a killer
disaster?
- By Travis Dunn, Disaster News, 28 December
2002. Dr. Doug Rokke ran the U.S. Army's depleted
uranium project in the mid-90s, and he was in charge of the
Army's effort to clean up depleted uranium after the
Persian Gulf War. He told the Army that DU was so dangerous
that it had to be banned from combat
immediately. Significant levels of radiation up to 50 meters
away from affected tanks. This stuff doesn't go away.
- UN General Assembly adopts Iraqi proposed
resolution
- Iraq Daily, Thursday 8
November 2001. Iraq had scored a strong diplomatic victory
when the 1st Committee on disarmament has adopted the
Iraqi proposal concerning the effects of using depleted
uranium in armament in spite of the strong opposition of
the US, Zionist entity [Israel] and European states.
- Depleted Uranium and its deadly
legacy
- [15 January 2001]. The recent death from leukemia of
several Italian peacekeepers in Kosovo has once again
focused attention on the use of weapons fortified with
depleted uranium (DU). Once used in battle, DU is regarded
as both a chemical and a radiation hazard. Its deadly
effects have been suspected in the deaths, debilitating
ailments and birth defects of thousands of innocent
civilians.
- The perfect weapon
- By Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services, [4 December
2003]. Our love affair with depleted uranium masks a war
crime in progress. “depleted uranium” isn't
really depleted of anything; it's dirty: U-238, the
low-level radioactive byproduct of the uranium enrichment
process.
- A Global Pact Against Depleted Uranium
- By Francis Boyle, 24 April 2005. During September of 2004
I launched an international campaign to conclude a global
pact against depleted uranium (DU) munitions by having every
state in the world officially and publicly take the position
that the Geneva Protocol of 1925 already includes within
itself a flat-out prohibition on the use of DU in wartime,
which they have no yet done. So far the United States is the
only government in the world that uses DU munitions during
wartime.
- Depleted uranium is WMD
- By Leuren Moret, Battle Creek Enquirer, 9
September 2005. Depleted uranium (DU) weaponry meets the
definition of weapon of mass destruction in two out of three
categories under U.S. Federal Code Title 50 Chapter 40
Section 2302. DU weaponry violates all international
treaties and agreements, Hague and Geneva war conventions,
the 1925 Geneva gas protocol, U.S. laws and U.S. military
law. DU weapons are most effective as bioweapons.