A United Nations report released January 5 said that UN teams have investigated 11 sites in Kosova and found eight are "considerably contaminated" with radioactivity. NATO says there are 112 such areas with targets where depleted uranium shells were used. Much of Kosova's water supply could be contaminated, the report warned, and residents have not been told of the danger or of any precautions to take.

"Depleted uranium" is the radioactive isotope 238 produced in the refining of uranium for use in nuclear power plants. Projectiles made of this material can penetrate steel armor better than other ammunition because of its weight and exceptional hardness. They also ignite on impact, releasing toxic and radioactive substances.

Washington used these munitions in its 100-hour ground assault against Iraq in 1991, and this may be responsible for the "Gulf War Syndrome" among U.S. soldiers, as well as affecting the health of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. The U.S. Navy has also used these shells in its military training exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques, where residents suffer unusually high cancer rates.

In Bosnia, the U.S. military fired 10,000 rounds of depleted uranium shells and later shot 31,000 rounds in Kosova in its war against the people of Yugoslavia. In a newspaper interview, Italian prime minister Giuliano Amato said, "We've always known that depleted uranium was used in Kosova, but not in Bosnia. We've always known that it was a danger only in exceptional circumstances like, for example, picking up a fragment with a hand on which there was an open wound, while in normal circumstances it isn't dangerous at all. But now we are starting to have a justified fear that things aren't that simple."

Both the Portuguese and Belgian governments also report deaths under similar circumstances among soldiers who served in the Balkans.

Families of the six dead soldiers released a document, dated Nov. 22,1999, that was sent by NATO to Italian commanders of troops involved in the assault and occupation of Kosova as guidelines for dealing with depleted uranium. The families say the soldiers had already spent months in Kosova by that date. The document contains a warning in English that says, "Inhalation of insoluble depleted uranium dust particles has been associated with long-term health effects, including cancers and birth defects."  
 
Use of uranium shells against Iraq
During the assault on Iraq by Washington and its allies, U.S. M1 Abrams tanks and Bradley armored personnel carriers used depleted uranium shells, as did the A-10 Warthog aircraft. U.S. tanks fired at least 14,000 large-caliber rounds and warplanes fired 940,000 small-caliber rounds that proved especially devastating to Iraqi armor. Army combat engineer Dwayne Mowrer was quoted in The Nation magazine in 1996 as saying that nearly half the vehicles along the "highway of death" heading toward Basra, Iraq, were hit with the explosive shells. "It leaves a nice round hole, almost like someone had welded it out," he said.

U.S. forces left behind about 300 tons of expended depleted uranium ammunition in Kuwait and Iraq. A 1995 study by the Iraqi government presented to the United Nations documents a sharp rise in the number of cases of leukemia and other cancers, especially in the Basra region.

The Pentagon, which has played down the effects of contact with this radioactive material, released a report in December claiming that its latest research "supports previous assessments that depleted uranium is not the cause of the illnesses some Gulf war veterans are experiencing."

Dr. Roger Coghill, a British biologist, noted at a recent conference in London that "one single particle of depleted uranium lodged in a lymph node can devastate the entire immune system."

According to the New York Times, "Besides the leukemia deaths and cases being treated" of soldiers who were in Bosnia and Kosova from European countries, "uncounted numbers of soldiers" have "complained about an array of symptoms, such as chronic fatigue, hair loss, and various types of cancer -- complaints similar to gulf war syndrome, registered after the Persian Gulf war in 1991."

Pekka Haavisto, head of the UN team investigating the impact of the ammunition in Kosova, said, "We found some radiation in the middle of villages where children were playing. We were surprised to find this a year and a half later. People had collected ammunition shards as souvenirs and there were cows grazing in contaminated areas, which means the contaminated dust can get into the milk."

He added, "There remains a risk for the local population."
 
 
Related article:
U.S. gov't and Balkans Syndrome  
 
 
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