Russian Scientist Believes US Army Can Use Weapons with Depleted Uranium Against Iraq

The US army can use armour-piercing weapons with a depleted uranium core in a war against Iraq, President of the Centre of Russia's Environmental Policy, Professor Alexei Yablokov, stated in his interview with RIA Novosti on Monday.

According to the famous scientist's estimates, a total of over 1,900 tons of such uranium weapons can be used in the coming military operation against Iraq. The scientist believes in this case radioactive nuclei can be spread over a few hundred kilometres by air currents and reach, for example, Israel.

When inside the body, uranium is able to cause cancer and other diseases, the professor pointed out.

Independent research in Kosovo showed that battle sites contained uranium-236 besides uranium-238, Yablokov stated. "This fact changes the situation completely," the famous scientist stressed. "If depleted uranium is not natural, but from atomic reactors, uranium cores must also contain other uranium isotopes and plutonium, hundred- and thousand-fold as radioactive as natural uranium-238," Alexei Yablokov pointed out.

Many thousands of US and British soldiers involved in the military operation in the Persian Gulf in 1991 have had problems with liver and kidneys, frequent chills, headaches, low blood pressure and loss of memory, the scientist recalled.

It has lately been established that the number of premature births, children with birth defects, people with leukaemia and other cancer diseases has increased by 3-4 times in the area near the Iraqi town of Basra, heavily polluted with uranium. According to Yablokov, over 60 percent of children born to the families of US veterans of the Persian Gulf war had the same birth defects (absence of eyes, ears, adhesions of fingers and vessels).

"Official medicine believes there is no connection between these diseases and uranium pollution, but scientific arguments proving the connection are steadily increasing," the scientist pointed out.

The European Parliament passed a resolution forbidding the use of depleted uranium weapons. Previously, a UN humanitarian committee stated that depleted uranium weapons should be considered weapons of mass destruction, for they mostly damage not those they were aimed against, but a great number of other people.