Iraq blames
depleted uranium
for cancer increaseBASRA, Iraq, Jan 9 (Reuters) - An Iraqi doctor said on Tuesday that cancer cases in the south of the country had risen since the 1991 gulf War and blamed this on radioactivity from depleted uranium shells used by U.S. and British forces.
"In my opinion, the main factor which caused cancer is radiation from the use of depleted uranium, in the southern part, where the American and British forces delivered more than 300 tonnes of DU (depleted uranium)," Dr Jawad Ali told Reuters Television at a hospital in the southern city of Basra.
Iraqi authorities have repeatedly accused Western powers of inflicting a creeping environmental disaster on the country's southern provinces by firing shells made with depleted uranium, which is used to harden them so they can pierce tank armour.
Earlier this year, a cancer conference organised by the Iraqi Health Ministry said that number of cancer cases registered in Iraq rose to 6,158 in 1997 from 4,341 in 1991.
The doctor's comments come amid growing fears of a "Balkans Syndrome" with reports of cancer among troops who served in NATO-led peacekeeping forces in Bosnia and Kosovo, where depleted uranium shells were used.
Doctors at the Basra hospital said that most of the patients were suffering from leukaemia.
Britain says depleted uranium rounds can produce small amounts of radioactive and toxic particles on impact, but argues that it is unlikely anyone outside the target area could be affected.
It said its Challenger tanks had fired fewer than 100 new 120-mm rounds with a uranium core against Iraqi forces and its armoured forces operated well away from population centres.
In 1998 Iraq sent a formal complaint to U.N. Secretary- General Kofi Annan reserving the right to compensation for the "appalling damage" caused by allied use of depleted uranium shells during the Gulf War, in which a Western-led alliance ejected invading Iraqi troops from Kuwait.
01-09-01
Copyright 2001 Reuters Limited.
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