HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK ---------------------------
U.N. Finds Uranium Toxins From NATO Arms in Serbia http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020327/sc_nm/yugoslavia_uranium_dc_1 Wed Mar 27,10:26 AM ET GENEVA (Reuters) - U.N. scientists said Wednesday they found widespread traces of depleted uranium from NATO munitions at five sites in Serbia and Montenegro but the level of contamination posed no immediate health threat. But they warned authorities to take precautions, particularly before allowing development projects, such as house building, on the sites because of the risk of stirring up potentially toxic soil and dust. "There is no health risk at the moment, but we do not know if there could be one if you make major soil removals," team leader Pekka Haavisto told a news conference. The team organized by the U.N. Environment Program went to six areas in the two republics that once formed part of Yugoslavia and found "widespread but low-level contamination" by depleted uranium at five. Depleted uranium is used to harden the tips of tank-busting shells fired by NATO during its mid-1990s Bosnia action and again during the air war to drive Serbian forces out of Kosovo. "The study concludes that the DU sites studied do not present immediate radioactive or toxic risks for the environment or human health," UNEP said in a statement, adding the findings were in line with a similar report last year on Kosovo. The two reports were ordered after a number of soldiers who served in NATO forces in Kosovo and Bosnia contracted leukemia, stirring fears that exposure to depleted uranium may have been the cause. The link has been consistently denied by the World Health Organization, which says levels of depleted uranium in the munitions were not high enough to cause cancer. Lower degrees of exposure have been tied to other health problems, including kidney disease. Although it was not directly part of the study, UNEP noted in the report that the WHO had also found no evidence to link depleted uranium to chromosome changes reported by Montenegro in six people who carried out decontamination work at its site. TRACES IN AIR Haavisto said that there were 11 sites in Serbia where NATO was known or believed to have fired DU-coated munitions, and the team chose the five most representative. There was only one such site in Montenegro. A site is an area of some 100 square yards around the spot where depleted uranium munitions struck a target. Traces of depleted uranium were found in soil samples and in the air, but there was no sign of any contamination of the water supplies, UNEP said. The lack of any trace in the water could be due to the fact that uranium in the soil had not yet permeated deep enough to reach the water table, and there was a need for vigilance, Haavisto told a news conference to present the findings. Haavisto said that drinking water should be tested once a year, adding the team had been surprised at finding depleted uranium in air samples more than two years after the end of the Yugoslav conflict. ________________________________ Copyright © 2002 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Copyright © 2002 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved http://www.yahoo.com ===== Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace. Weekly peace walks around Lake Merritt in Oakland. Starts & ends at the colonnade between Grand & Lakeshore Avenues, 3 P.M., every Sunday. Info: (510)763-8712, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> or http://www.webwm.com/LMNOP __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Movies - coverage of the 74th Academy Awards® http://movies.yahoo.com/ --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
