War-related birth defects in Fallujah after US uranium & phosphorus use

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War-related birth defects in Fallujah

Fri, 30 May 2008 02:18:44

 

 

_http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=57875 & sectionid=351020201_

(http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=57875 & sectionid=351020201)

 

 

 

Families in Fallujah are calling for an investigation into the rise of birth

defects after the US used phosphorus over the Iraqi city in 2004.

 

They have raised concerns about the weapons used by American forces in 2004,

including constant bombardment with uranium depleted artillery shells and

other depleted uranium ammunition- when Fallujah suffered the heaviest blitze

following the overthrow of the Saddam regime of the entire war in Iraq.

 

Hikmat Tawfeeq, deputy chairman of the Fallujah-based human rights group

Al-akhiyar said: " We have around 200 cases of deformities recorded by our

society. Most of these cases are birth deformities which have arisen after the

bombing of Fallujah. "

 

Campaigners say officials are reluctant to speak out publicly because of US

pressure but at Fallujah's children's hospital one doctor told Sky News in

the past month she has seen one or two cases of birth deformities every day.

 

An opthalmologist said he deals with four or five cases of newborn babies

every week suffering from some form of eye deformity.

 

At one of the cemeteries in Fallujah, undertaker Mahmoud Hummadi said he

usually buries four to five bodies of newborns every day and most of them are

deformed.

 

Fallujah today still bears the scars of a time when it represented the

backbone of the Sunni insurgency - a power-base America decided it had to break.

 

April and November 2004 saw some of the heaviest bombardments of the war in

Iraq, including the controversial use of white phosphorous.

 

 

 

It is a highly flammable material which ignites when it comes into contact

with oxygen, causing severe burns.

 

In a statement to Sky News the US military said it had used white phosphorus

in Fallujah but primarily as a smokescreen and not as an incendiary weapon.

 

The families say doctors have raised concerns to them about what kinds of

materials were used by the Americans in order to achieve their military goals.

 

Fatima Ahmed is three years old. Small and lifeless she barely moves,

burdened by two heads on her tiny frame.

 

Her mother Shukriya says doctors have been unable to diagnose exactly what

has caused Fatima's condition.

 

But her father Jassim, when asked who he held responsible for his daughter's

condition, said: " It's because of the war - it's the flagrant aggression

they launched against us. What they dropped in Fallujah God knows. "

 

MMA/HAR

 

 

 

 

 

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