EXCERPT:
Depleted Uranium (DU) Victim
Afghanistan
"CANADIAN URANIUM IS BASICALLY PROVIDING THE MATERIAL FOR THESE [DU] WEAPONS And I really would ask you to make this an issue in the front / centre and STOP IT NOW AS QUICKLY AS YOU CAN !! -- Dr. Rosalie Bertell, authority on Depleted Uranium (DU).
http://www.peace.ca/depleteduranium.htm
Photos of Babies Deformed at Birth as a Result of Depleted Uranium (DU) 2003 photos: Dr. Jenan Hassan WARNING: Extremely Graphic Images!
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2003/DU-Baby2003.htm
by Dr. Alfred Lambremont Webre
http://www.globalresearch.ca
Depleted Uranium (DU) Victim
Afghanistan
"CANADIAN URANIUM IS BASICALLY PROVIDING THE MATERIAL FOR THESE [DU] WEAPONS And I really would ask you to make this an issue in the front / centre and STOP IT NOW AS QUICKLY AS YOU CAN !! -- Dr. Rosalie Bertell, authority on Depleted Uranium (DU).
http://www.peace.ca/depleteduranium.htm
Photos of Babies Deformed at Birth as a Result of Depleted
Uranium (DU) 2003 photos: Dr. Jenan Hassan WARNING: Extremely Graphic
Images!
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2003/DU-Baby2003.htm
Let's Follow the Example of Belgium and Make Abolishing the Use of Canadian Uranium in any Depleted Uranium (DU) Weapons world-wide a Priority Issue Now!
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DU & Public Health: The public health effects of the use of Depleted Uranium (DU) weapons are such that their use can be considered per se violations of the war crime of Genocide under the Statute of the International Criminal Court. The documented devastating effects of DU weapons on public health include:
3.0 Findings: The negative impacts of radiation from nuclear
weapons and nuclear weapons testing, nuclear power and nuclear
reactors, and depleted uranium weaponry, include but are not limited to
the following.
3.1 Cancer
3.2 Birth defects
3.3 Chronic diseases caused by neurological and neuromuscular radiation damage
3.4 Mitochondrial diseases (Chronic fatigue syndrome, Lou Gehrig’s, Parkinsons nad Alzheimer’s; Heart and brain disorders)
3.5 Global DNA damage in men’s sperm; Infertility in women.
3.6 Learning disabilities
3.7 Mental illness
3.8 Birth rates & death rates
3.9 Diabetes
3.10 Infant mortality and low birth weights
3.11 Atmospheric testing impact on Environment
3.12
It is hereby found that the only feasible remedy to cease the damage
to the environment and public health caused by ionizing radiation, and
to safeguard the future of humanity and all living things, is to
permanently abolish all nuclear technologies.
http://peaceinspace.blogs.com/peaceinspaceorg/2007/03/nuclear_free_zo.html
See also:
International Criminal Tribunal For Afghanistan at Tokyo - Final Written Opinion of Judge Niloufer Bhagwat 10mar04
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5855.htm
Uranium & The War
http://www.cityonahillpress.com/article.php?id=474
Nothing Depleted About Depleted Uranium
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=BUL20060122&articleId=1777
"Occupational Hazards of War: All the Questions About DU (Depleted Uranium) and Gulf War Syndrome Are Not Yet Answered." Dr. Rosalie Bertell
http://peaceinspace.blogs.com/campaign_for_a_positive_f/2007/03/occupational_ha.html
DU & International Law: Depleted Uranium and DU weapons are already prohibited as Weapons of Mass Destruction under existing international conventions and treaties. "According to a August 2002 report by the UN subcommission, laws which are breached by the use of DU shells include: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; the Charter of the United Nations; the Genocide Convention; the Convention Against Torture; the four Geneva Conventions of 1949; the Conventional Weapons Convention of 1980; and the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, which expressly forbid employing 'poison or poisoned weapons' and 'arms, projectiles or materials calculated to cause unnecessary suffering'. All of these laws are designed to spare civilians from unwarranted suffering in armed conflicts."
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0330-02.htm
What is lacking in the enforcement of this existing international law prohibition.
CANADIAN DU ABOLITION: As of March 2007, Belgium has become the first nation to adopt legislation specifically abolishing the use of Depleted Uranium in weapons.
http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/en/a/118.html
Canada - One of the world's top exporters of Uranium used for U.S. and other DU weapons - must now adopt legislation abolishing the use of Depleted Uranium in weapons and abolishing the use of Canadian Uranium in Depleted Uranium (DU) in weapons.
The use of Canadian Uranium in any DU weapon - whether Canadian
Uranium
is enriched and manufactured into DU weapons in the USA or elsewhere,
or whether DU weapons are manufactured in Canada - is against existing
Canadian policy. There is considerable evidence that Canada is not
enforcing its declared policy against the use by the U.S. Government
and others of Canadian Uranium for DU weapons purposes.
http://temagami.carleton.ca/jmc/cnews/19012001/n1.htm
CANADIAN LEGISLATION: The legislation we are seeking in Canada, like Belgium's recent legislation prohibiting DU weapons, is Canadian-enforceable legislation "to permanently prohibit the Canadian use, sale, development, production, testing, storage, transportation and export of depleted uranium munitions, depleted uranium weapons, or any manufactured parts or other object containing depleted uranium." Moreover, the legislation would prohibit the use or export of Canadian Uranium where such Uranium will be processed into a depleted uranium munition, weapon, or manufactured depleted uranium part.
WRITE YOUR PARTY LEADER & WRITE YOUR M.P.
GO TO:
http://www.canada.gc.ca/directories/direct_e.html
Please contact your local M.P. (Member of Parliament), and ask for legislation to enforce Canada's policy against the use of Canadian Uranium in any DU weapons, anywhere. Alert your MP of the devastating public health hazards of Depleted Uranium (DU) weapons. Public health is severely endangered by atmospheric DU nanoparticles. Canadian soldiers, as well as the Canadian population, are now at risk, as Depleted Uranium (DU) nanoparticles are carried by the jetstream and westerlies to the atmosphere over North America. Canadian Uranium is literally poisoning the world. By specifically focusing in this way on enforcement of Canadian policy against the use of Canadian Uranium in DU weapons, we can shut off a significant supply of depleted uranium for the USA and the other 17 or so nations that now use or store DU weapons.
Thank you.
AUDIO TRANSCRIPT -[prepared by Janet M. Eaton] of remarks by:
DR. ROSALIE BERTELL speaking on DEPLETED URANIUM [DU] WEAPONS and CANADA'S central ROLE in the PRODUCTION of these weapons.
http://www.interlog.com/~nealm/index.htm
Dr. Bertell was one of nine prominent Canadians speaking at:
An Unjust and Illegal WAR: Leading opponents of the War against Yugoslavia speak out: A public meeting held at Convocation Hall
at the University of Toronto May 6 1999.
Dr. Rosalie Bertell is one of the world's leading authorities on health effects of low level radiation. For a decade she worked for the US National Cancer Institute and for 30 years has been in the forefront of research on the effects of low level radiation on human health. In 1984 she founded the International Institute of Concern for Public Health in Toronto.
For further background on Dr. Bertell see :
"Dr. Rosalie Bertell - A Great Humanitarian & Scientist"
http://news.flora.org/flora.mai-not/11275
All the best,
Janet M. Eaton, PhD
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Audio Transcript:
I'd like to talk about a little known factor in this war and that is the kind of ammunition which is being used. It's called Depleted Uranium [DU] but don't let that fool you - it doesn't mean it's harmless. Depleted Uranium is basically radioactive waste. It's the waste from uranium enrichment. When the uranium is taken out of the ground most of it is Uranium 238 but they like the fissioning of 235 which is less than 1 percent of the whole - so when they do uranium enrichment they basically try to increase the proportion of the uranium 235 that fissions and the rest of the uranium, and a lot of it, is considered waste.
For a long time in 70's there was an effort to declare this waste - scrap metal and use it in our refrigerators and stoves and bicycles and automobiles and many of us were out there protesting this and we actually won and they stopped talking about that but very quietly on the side they gave this uranium free of charge to weapons manufacturers.
And what they discovered was its more dense than lead which means it so goes through a tank or an armored car, or a bullet proof vest. It's what's called auto pyrophoric which means it can burst into flame and when it does it becomes an aerosol and also - you know how when you make pottery if you put in a kiln and fire it you get a glass - well that's what happens to uranium when you ignite it in battle.
This was actually used for the first time by the Russians in Afghanistan but on a very small scale. The first time used on a very large scale was in Iraq in Gulf War and it was used extensively by the US and the UK. According to the Pentagon 400,000 American veterans were exposed to this depleted uranium aerosol in the Gulf War. About 200,000 of these men and women have sought medical care since the war and about 115,000 have been diagnosed as having Gulf War Syndrome. Now one would think in the United States of America given this new weapon and this massive exposure and these sick veterans that they would have tested the veterans for Depleted Uranium.
I was in Washington DC 10 days ago and I found that not one American veteran had been tested for Depleted Uranium in the 9 years since Iraq war. We actually have tested some of the veterans here in Canada and we have found Depleted Uranium in their urine at quite a high level and remember this is 9 years after their exposure which means that the amount that they are now excreting is nothing compared to what the original dose was.
There has been quite a dispute, which some of you may know, since the war is on in Kosovo whether or not Depleted Uranium ammunition was being used. In a sense this adds to the problem but you should know that every Cruise missile contains Depleted Uranium ballast and when that missile impacts that ballast is again aerosolized into very small particles of uranium glass that can be breathed in and it will stay in body 10 years or more and it keeps irradiating the tissue around it wherever it is in the body!!
Canada has been an international leader against land mines but this depleted uranium is worse than land mines and it will stay around for thousands of years after the war is over. It is incorporated into the farm land; it can be picked up by the vegetables; the schrapnel can be handled by children ; it stays around ; it doesn't disappear; and because it's an aerosol it can travel as much as 50 - 60 km from the point of release.
THIS IS CHEMCIAL AND RADIOLOGICAL WARFARE - IT'S OUTRAGEOUS - IT'S A VERY SERIOUS VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS!!
I think this talk about chemical warfare in Iraq and violation of
Human Rights in Serbia is outrageous - because if anyone is waging
chemical and radiological warfare and violating human rights it's
NATO !!
In 1996 this issue was brought before the Human Rights Tribunal in Geneva and the Tribunal condemned it as warfare. They actually called Depleted Uranium a weapon of mass destruction. I think it might be better called a weapon of indiscriminate destruction but they didn't really have a term for it. I say indescriminate because it will by choice affect women and children. Women have tisses that are more radioactively sensitive like the breast and uterine tissue. Children are closer to the ground; they're growing; they'll incorporate more uranium into their bones when they grow and they also have a longer life span so that the cancers that have a longer latency can be expressed. So it selects out women and children.
Anyway it was condemned by United Nations Human Rights Commission and they have appointed a rapporteur to prepare a brief for the United Nations. It's not completed yet.
The World Health Organization has sent a team into Iraq to look at the aftermath of war but they just went in last fall and they expect to spend two years in study.
So I think you can see that the forces for good here are slow compared to the extent at which this is being used and the rapidity with which it is being used not only in Iraq but Bosnia and Kosovo .
So I would call this to your attention- and I would ask you to make this known.
It's largely Canadian uranium that's being used!!
Canada has a policy that its uranium cannot be used in Nuclear Bombs!
That policy does not extend to these DU weapons. So you really have to complain loudly about this !
Canada also sends its uranium down to Paducah, Kentucky to be enriched and it does not ask for the return of the waste. If that waste stays in US for 30 days by US law it becomes US uranium.
SO CANADIAN URANIUM IS BASICALLY PROVIDING THE MATERIAL FOR THESE WEAPONS.
And I really would ask you to make this an issue in the front /centre and STOP IT NOW AS QUICKLY AS YOU CAN !!
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RADIO COGNITO - CIUT 89.5 FM
http://www.interlog.com/~nealm/index.htm
REAL AUDIO PROGRAMS
An Unjust and Illegal WAR: public meeting held at Convocation Hall at
the University of Toronto May 6 1999. Leading opponents of the War
against Yugoslavia speak out:
Ad-Hoc Committee to Stop Canada's Participation in the War on
Yugoslavia ccafttor@sympatico.ca 416-922-STOP
Note: A link for downloading the files via FTP is below the speakers
list.
An Unjust and Illegal WAR May 6 1999
Click on Green "Play" buttons or underlined text to play
Chair: David Orchard Introduction
James Bissett: former Canadian ambassador to Yugoslavia,
Bulgaria and Albania 1990-92
Roland Keith: former director of
Kosovo Polje Field Office of the Kosovo Verification Mission,
99
Dr. Rosalie Bertell: leading authority on health effects of
low level radiation on human health
David Jacobs: lawyer, and human rights activist
David Orchard: comments on ad-hoc committee
Michel Chossudovsky: Professor of economics, University of
Ottawa, author: The Globalization of Poverty
Dr. Ursula Franklin: FRSC, Companion of the Order of canada,
Professor Emeritus University of Toronto
Marjaleena Repo: freelance writer, media critic and
activist
David Orchard: author of The Fight for Canada, farmer, former
candidate for Progressive Conservative Party leadership
Question and Answer 40:00 min
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