Title: Message
GOVERNMENT DU-PLICITY
By Susan Riordon &
Davey Garland
Great liars are also great
magicians" - Adolf Hitler.
IT IS appropriate to quote
from someone so despicable, about those who have created a despicable act, and
have lied and covered up their crimes for over 12 years. The wall of silence or
dis-information over Depleted Uranium held by the US and UK government has been
near impregnable. But cracks have now emerged, be it from veterans, or
scientists, over a decade of collating, researching and painstaking “digging” by
activists and academics which may rock or even ruin some government Ministers
and officials. The last months have seen a number of incidents which has seen
the tight DU ship of lies spring a number of leaks.
It hit choppy waters
first at the World Uranium Weapons Conference held in Hamburg in October, 2003,
at which the global DU movement came together pro-actively for the first time,
with activists, veterans, scientists and lawyers agreeing on solid, cohesive
means of action. The Conference called for the abolition of all uranium weapons
and confirmed acceptance of the United Nations Sub-commission on the Promotion
and Protection of Human Rights finding, that Depleted Uranium weapons are
illegal. Accordingly, the Hamburg officially called for the abolition of the
use of and halt to the proliferation of these weapons.
The Hamburg
Conference concluded: “The evidence from scientists, medical professionals
and legal experts at this conference is clear: DU is causing significant health
effects worldwide... is illegal under existing International Law and
Conventions” The Conference also called for the cessation of the manufacture
testing, or use of these weapons. This was the final and unanimous agreement of
Conference.
“Rubbing in the Salt”
A recent DU milestone
was that of Kenny Duncan, who brought the U.K. Ministry of Defence to an
Edinburgh based Pension Appeal Tribunal in January, claiming DU contamination
from active service during Gulf war 1. The Tribunal ruled for DU contamination
from dust from burnt out tanks. However, showing its own confusion and duplicity
in the affair, the MoD and Government managed to turn down an appeal by over
2000 Gulf veterans, over Gulf War Syndrome, while at the same time, agreeing to
commission an independent investigation into the causes of GWS, based at the
Cambridge Centre. Many involved with the DU question regard this as another
empty gesture. This particular unit, is infamous for its research on ME, which
it opined mainly a psychological problem and may well conclude the same
regarding GWS, given the track record of previous government investigation into
the debilitating health problems.
The Ministry of Defence, however has
opened itself to attack should it deny DU is a threat, since soldiers in Iraq
have been issued with Medical card “F Med 1018” in which the MoD states:
“You have been deployed to a theatre where Depleted Uranium (DU)
Munitions have been used. DU is weakly radioactive heavy metal, which has the
potential to cause ill health. You may have been exposed to dust containing DU
during you deployment.”
The card continues to advise soldiers to check
with their medical officer on return to their home base. They even gave out a
Website:
http://www.mod.uk/issuesdepleted_uranium/index.htm
The British government and its military forces,
however, largely continue to reinforce an international policy which has
continued since the dawn of the nuclear age, in concert with pro-nuclear
institutions such as the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA) actively
suppressing reports and documents which link DU/Uranium weapons and ill-health.
A recent example is a Report commissioned by the World Health
Organisation (WHO) on the effects of DU amongst the civilian populations of
Iraq. Professor Keith Braverstock who completed the study in 2001 believes that
the WHO purposely suppressed the findings, and that if the Report had been
published it would have seriously affected public support for any new war in
Iraq. Braverstock and two other radiation experts Mike Thorne AND Carmel
McMaster, reinforced the already accepted view by authorative opponents of DU,
that the chemically toxic and radioactive dust emanating from such weapons can
cause cancer and other severe ailments. This might also explain why the United
Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) has been refused permission by the US
authorities to enter Iraq and make environmental impact assessments and monitor
DU related health effects since the latest US/UK attack. No doubt anyway, its
mandate would be as woefully and duplicitously restricted as it was in Bosnia,
Kosovo and Afghanistan!
We are dealing with a war on information, a
determination there be a lack of it. “Information warfare” is term that has been
increasingly used by the military to undermine its opponents. However,
historically, it has been more often used against it own people, particularly in
the United States and Britain, through the FBI’s Cointelpro and the MI5
respectively, which on numerous occasions have targeted informed progressive
movements. This murky world of censorship, hyped paranoia and attack on free
speech has been recently updated in the US (and Britain also) with the
introduction of the Patriot Act.
When they are not successful through
smear campaigns and infiltration, then they resort to intimidation and even
assassination. The anti-nuclear (including the anti-DU groups) movement being a
prime witness to these tactics with threats, arrests, murders, offices broken
into, records, computers and data removed. But determined opposition will not
crumble and in recent years, many committed activists have brought about a
global alert and awareness. Much of the general public now knows of the dangers
of DU and other uranium weapons, but has realised that terrifyingly, five
“radioactive” wars have been fought since 1991.
To highlight just a
few of the now numerous campaigns:
US Gulf Veteran and radiation
expert, former Pentagon advisor, Dr Doug Rokke – himself severely sick
from DU - ex-Major, turned whistle-blower after being sent to Iraq following the
first Gulf War, to estimate the dangers of DU for the US Department of Defence
(DoD), He, and other gravely ill soldiers and civilian victims travel the world
relentlessly alerting audiences to the justice and health care that sufferers so
vitally need. Rokke's unique expertise and recommendations on the clean-up
possibilities and unique dangers of DU have been scrupulously ignored, because
of combat needs on the ground and the fact that this lethal weapon has another
unique property – it is radioactive redundancy from the nuclear fuel cycle, so
the military gets it free of charge, since no one wants it in their back yard, -
and it costs a fortune to keep in a safe and stable environment. Thus, dropping
it on a hospital, mosque, kindergarten, or government building is a cheap method
of disposal and ensures maximum destruction. It also remains polluting,
poisoning and radiating for four and a half billion years.
The tireless
work of Dr. Asaf Durakovic and his independent team of scientists from
the Uranium Medical Research Centre have tested and found positive many
DU contaminated veterans. Im addition to this - at great health risk to
themselves - the team has visited the world's radiological battle zones, testing
the local population and environment. Their work has proven the direct link
between uranium weapons and radioactive contamination of these countries. The
UMRC'S findings contradict starkly the official governments' “scientific
evaluation”, both of the countries and the amount of uranium weapons used. They
remain unwavering in their determination to expose the toxicity of uranium
weapons and present and future damage to the populations of Iraq, the Balkans
and Afghanistan, despite all efforts to demean their expertise and threats to
their very existence.
The Afghan DU Relief Fund is operated and
privately financed by an Afghan exile, US based, Dr Mohammed Miraki. Like
the country that has disappeared from our view, so has the continued suffering
and hardship of the people. But Dr Miraki travels on his own finances to raise
further funds and to not alone relate the suffering, but to attempt to ensure
sufficient relief and health care to treat the terrible illnesses that the
population is now encountering. "They have turned my sweet Afghanistan into a
poisoned burial ground” comments Miraki.
It is not alone the
veterans, but also their families or remaining partners who crave and fight for
justice. Susan Riordon is the widow of Captain Terry Riordon, late of the
Canadian army, who was the world’s first veteran to be officially diagnosed as
dieing with Gulf War Syndrome. Terry had served his country for 23 years and
convinced that he was contaminated with DU, asked his wife to use his body to
prove that DU was the cause. He donated his body to research for his fellow
veterans. His death certificate records: "Cause of death: Gulf War
Syndrome”.
DU was the proven “Killer”. It had invaded virtually
every tissue and organ of his body. Dead five years, Terry speaks to Science. A
dead man standing for the veterans, for DU's “Dead and Dying”. His wife now
relentlessly challenges the Canadian government to accept her husband’s
diagnosis and to support those other veterans who are going down with GWS.
Richard “Nibby” David, in the UK, illustrates how DU/uranium
reaches not only military but civilian levels. David is taking one of the
world’s biggest multi-nationals to court, to prove his contamination from
uranium metal while working in the aerospace industry - and to prove its
proliferation into a whole variety of civilian products. This is a modern “David
&Goliath” battle, with a DU victim prepared to sacrifice everything to prove
both the cause of his own illness and to more widely expose how these metals are
seeping into our environment, our workplaces and our homes.
Terry
Riordon, Doug Rokke, Richard David, one dead, two dying, all victims of the
emotional and financial rape of their families. They are the few. Countless
others struggle financially and physically to raise their voices in the
political wilderness. DU is banned; it kills - and one microscopic particle is
enough. As in Iraq and other “testing” grounds, it leads to omnicide, poisoning
humanity, the new born, the unborn, fauna, flora and water supply leaving
nothing unscathed or unpolluted - for all time
Never has this dynamic
movement’s grass-roots expertise, commitment and resilience been more needed.
With every small victory, such as Kenny Duncan’s and the courage of
Professor Braverstock to speak out over the WHO’s partisanship, the movement
will be that much closer to eliminating this uniquely shameful and lethal
scourge on humanity and everything living thing.
But more of those with
power and influence must also speak out. In the US, it is election year, and so
far, in the Democratic Party primaries, only Dennis Kucinich has spoken
for the need to abolish DU. Will Kerry, one wonder, have the guts to address DU
as he did Agent Orange and the health of Vietnam veterans?
The Hamburg
Conference demonstrated the empowerment of unity, with world experts and
committed activists from all corners of the globe sharing knowledge, strategies
and ideas. That unity is now needed in the wider public arena to reinforce the
illegality of these weapons and to force their abolition on
governments.
Karen Parker, the lawyer responsible for determining
the UN rule on Depleted Uranium Weapons being illegal, asked if she sees DU as a
nuclear weapon, responded: “I think so. The UN has condemned the use of them.
They are illegal weapons, and they are illegal for more reasons than the
depleted uranium. They’re just indiscriminate weapons”.
Susan
Riordan is the widow of Captain Terry Riordon, and Atlantic Director,
Canadian Peacekeeping Veterans Association and Davey Garland is organiser
for the Pandora DU Research Project and a Tutor in Radical Media Studies.
Both are part of the International grass-roots initiative to abolish DU and all
radioactive weapons.
Canadian Peacekeeping Veterans Association:
http://members.shaw.ca/cpva/
Pandora DU Research Project: http://www.pandoraproject.org
Suggested Sites to look at in regard some of the real shakers and movers
in publicising the case over DU/uranium weapons/products
Beatrice
Boctor and her environmental work for Iraq:
http://www.desertconcerns.org
Dai Williams: http://www.eoslifework.co.uk/du2012.htm
Doug Rokke: http://traprockpeace.org/RokkePressConf23July03.html
Karen Parker: http://www.uraniumweaponsconference.de/speakers/parker_illegality.pdf
Low Level Radiation Campaign: http://www.llrc.org/
Dr
Miraki Afghan DU Recovery Fund: http://www.afghandufund.org/
Dr Leuren Moret: What does the US government know about DU:
http://traprockpeace.org/moret_25nov03.pdf
“Nibby David” Campaign article:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/westcountry/2003/11/282063.html
Uranium Medical Research Centre: http://www.umrc.net/
& for
Spanish readers:
Coalición Internacional para la Abolición de las Armas
Radiactivas and the work of Alfredo Embid: http://www.amcmh.org/
All
information from the Uranium Weapons Conference can be found at:
http://www.uraniumweaponsconference.de
Please also see:
WHO ‘suppressed’ scientific study into
depleted uranium cancer fears in Iraq http://www.sundayherald.com/40096
DEPLETED URANIUM SAFETY FEARS CONTINUE + UPDATES
http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=1461&blz=1
IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED ON DEPLETED URANIUM -
Dr. Doug Rokke, Ph.D.
http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=1464&blz=1
DEPLETED URANIUM: THE WAR CRIME THAT HAS NO END,
by Paul Rockwell
http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=1462&blz=1
http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout4.php&id=1487&blz=1
