csua.org/u/e2u -> news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article328703.ece
Americas US intelligence classified white phosphorus as 'chemical weapon' By Peter Popham and Anne Penketh Published: 23 November 2005 The Italian journalist who launched the controversy over the American use of white phosphorus (WP) as a weapon of war in the Fallujah siege has a ccused the Americans of hypocrisy. Sigfrido Ranucci, who made the documentary for the RAI television channel aired two weeks ago, said that a US intelligence assessment had charact erised WP after the first Gulf War as a "chemical weapon". The assessment was published in a declassified report on the American Dep artment of Defence website. The file was headed: "Possible use of phosph orous chemical weapons by Iraq in Kurdish areas along the Iraqi-Turkish- Iranian borders." In late February 1991, an intelligence source reported, during the Iraqi crackdown on the Kurdish uprising that followed the coalition victory ag ainst Iraq, "Iraqi forces loyal to President Saddam may have possibly us ed white phosphorous chemical weapons against Kurdish rebels and the pop ulace in Erbil and Dohuk. The WP chemical was delivered by artillery rou nds and helicopter gunships." According to the intelligence report, the "reports of possible WP chemica l weapon attacks spread quickly among the populace in Erbil and Dohuk. A s a result, hundreds of thousands of Kurds fled from these two areas" ac ross the border into Turkey. "When Saddam used WP it was a chemical weapon," said Mr Ranucci, "but whe n the Americans use it, it's a conventional weapon. The injuries it infl icts, however, are just as terrible however you describe it." In the television documentary, eyewitnesses inside Fallujah during the bo mbardment in November last year described the terror and agony suffered by victims of the shells . Two former American soldiers who fought at Fa llujah told how they had been ordered to prepare for the use of the weap ons. it - show the strange corpses found afte r the city's destruction, many with their skin apparently melted or cara melised so their features were indistinguishable. Mr Ranucci said he had seen photographs of "more than 100" of what he described as "anomalous corpses" in the city. The US State Department and the Pentagon have shifted their position repe atedly in the aftermath of the film's showing. After initially saying th at US forces do not use white phosphorus as a weapon, the Pentagon now s ays that WP had been used against insurgents in Fallujah. The use of WP against civilians as a weapon is prohibited. Military analysts said that there remain questions about the official US position regarding its observance of the 1980 conventional weapons treat y which governs the use of WP as an incendiary weapon and sets out clear guidelines about the protection of civilians. Daryl Kimball, director of the Arms Control Association in Washington, ca lled for an independent investigation of the use of WP during the Falluj ah siege. "If it was used as an incendiary weapon, clear restrictions ap ply," he said. "Given that the US and UK went into Iraq on the ground that Saddam Hussei n had used chemical weapons against his own people, we need to make sure that we are not violating the laws that we have subscribed to," he adde d Yesterday Adam Mynott, a BBC correspondent in Nassiriya in April 2003, to ld Rai News 24 that he had seen WP apparently used as a weapon against i nsurgents in that city.
|
http://csua.com/feed/