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The Green Party of the United States
FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MARCH 6, 2003
3:02 PM
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CONTACT:
The
Green Party of the United States
Nancy Allen, 207-326-4576, nallen@acadia.net
Scott McLarty, 202-518-5624, scottmclarty@yahoo.com
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Support U.S. Troops -- Bring Them Home!, Say
Greens;
Depleted uranium, possible Iraqi resistance to
a ground invasion, and other hazards await American soldiers,
warn Greens; high casualty rates are likely because of battlefield
radiation after the first Gulf War.
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| WASHINGTON
- March 6 - "Greens fully support U.S. troops -- we demand that
they be removed from harm's way," said Beth Ingalls, member of
the Truckee, California, Town Council. "One of the reasons for
our opposition to President Bush's planned invasion of Iraq is
the heavy casualty rate expected, not just among Iraqi civilians,
but among American soldiers and their families."
Greens warn
that a ground invasion of Iraq may meet massive resistance, costing
the lives of many American service members. American casualties
in the invasion will also come from friendly fire and from depleted
uranium shell casings that were used in the first Persian Gulf
War. The U.S. intends to use depleted uranium again in the coming
invasion.
"The U.S. dumped
320 tons of depleted uranium in spent ammunition on Iraq during
the last Gulf War," said T.E. Smith, Vietnam War veteran and member
of the D.C. Statehood Green Party. "This is the battlefield into
which American soldiers will be sent."
Exposure to
radiation from depleted uranium is the likely cause of numerous
health problems in thousands of Gulf War veterans and their families,
including cancer, leukemia, tumors, and high rates of birth defects
because of genetic damage. 221,000 U.S. soldiers who fought in
the war or were stationed in war zones after the war have been
awarded disability, according to a Veterans Affairs report issued
on September 10, 2002. The casualty rate for the first Persian
Gulf War veterans is about 30%.
60 Minutes
(CBS) has reported complaints from American service members that
safety from exposure to nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons
has been inadequate and low-priority. The Independent (U.K.) reports
that U.S. itself will use toxic chemical weapons in the invasion
of Iraq, in violation of the 1992 Chemical Weapons Convention.
"'Calmative' gases, similar to the one that killed 120 hostages
in the Moscow theatre siege last year, could also be employed.
The convention bans the use of these toxic agents in battle, not
least because they risk causing an escalation to full chemical
warfare.... Leading experts and Whitehall officials fear that
using even pepper spray and CS gas would destroy the credibility
of the Chemical Weapons Convention, provoke Iraqi chemical retaliation
and set a disastrous legal precedent." (The Independent, March
2, 2003)
"The members
of the Bush Administration, some 30 of whom have direct financial
relations with the defense industry, have so much to gain from
the war that they're willing to invade regardless of the danger
it poses to American soldiers," said Tom Bolema, Juniper Hills
(California) Town Councilperson. "They're about to launch this
war regardless of the likely high number of Iraqi civilian casualties,
regardless of the condemnation of nations and people around the
world and in the U.S., regardless of pleas from the U.N. inspectors
to let the inspections continue, regardless of Iraq's destruction
of its own missiles."
MORE INFORMATION
The Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
National office: 1314 18th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036 202-296-7755,
866-41GREEN
60 Minutes
reports "Bio/Chem Attack Protection Questioned" http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/02/14/60minutes/main540691.shtml
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/30/attack/main531271.shtml
"Iraq Links
Cancers to Uranium Weapons: U.S. Likely to Use Arms Again in War"
by Robert Collier The San Francisco Chronicle, January 13, 2003
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0113-01.htm
WISE (World
Information Service on Energy) Uranium Project http://www.antenna.nl/wise/uranium/
Military Use of Depleted Uranium http://www.antenna.nl/wise/uranium/#MILDU
Gulf War
Veteran Resource Pages: "Information on the Web for Gulf War Veterans
suffering the mysterious collection of maladies known as Gulf
War Syndrome" http://www.gulfweb.org
National
Gulf War Resource Center http://www.ngwrc.org/
Veterans
Call to Conscience Campaign http://www.calltoconscience.net
###
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