Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases

TruthOut
By Dahr Jamail (Al Jazeera)
March 18, 2013

Contamination from Depleted Uranium (DU) munitions and other military-related pollution is suspected of causing a sharp rises in congenital birth defects, cancer cases, and other illnesses throughout much of Iraq.

Many prominent doctors and scientists contend that DU contamination is also connected to the recent emergence of diseases that were not previously seen in Iraq, such as new illnesses in the kidney, lungs, and liver, as well as total immune system collapse. DU contamination may also be connected to the steep rise in leukaemia, renal, and anaemia cases, especially among children, being reported throughout many Iraqi governorates.

There has also been a dramatic jump in miscarriages and premature births among Iraqi women, particularly in areas where heavy US military operations occurred, such as Fallujah.

Official Iraqi government statistics show that, prior to the outbreak of the First Gulf War in 1991, the rate of cancer cases in Iraq was 40 out of 100,000 people. By 1995, it had increased to 800 out of 100,000 people, and, by 2005, it had doubled to at least 1,600 out of 100,000 people. Current estimates show the increasing trend continuing.

As shocking as these statistics are, due to a lack of adequate documentation, research, and reporting of cases, the actual rate of cancer and other diseases is likely to be much higher than even these figures suggest. …

Read on: http://truth-out.org/news/item/15166-iraq-wars-legacy-of-cancer

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Global Post
April 22, 2012

Eight American soldiers died of drug overdoses while the US Army has investigated 56 soldiers on suspicion of using or distributing heroin, morphine or other opiates during deployments in Afghanistan in 2010 and 2011, military statistics reveal.

Meanwhile, heroin use is on the rise in the Army overall, CNN reported, with the number of soldiers testing positive for heroin growing from 10 instances in 2002 to 116 in 2010.

Meanwhile, some Afghan forces that are being trained by the US military to take over the mission by 2014 have been found dealing drugs to American soldiers, according to Judicial Watch, a conservative US watchdog group.

According to Fox News, a December 2011 report from Army Criminal Investigation Command showed that at one forward operation base, hash, pot and heroin were purchased “from various Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police personnel.”

Read on: www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/afghanistan/120422/american-soldiers-drug-overdoses-us-army-heroi

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Independent Online
December 11 2011

As US forces pull out of Iraq, residents and officials in Falluja say they leave behind bullet-riddled homes, destroyed infrastructure and a worrying increase in birth defects and maladies in a city polluted by weapons and war chemicals.

Amir Hussain and Awfa Abdullah got married in Falluja in 2004 but their lives were turned upside by the birth of their two babies.

Their first child, a baby boy born in 2006, had brain damage and died last year. The second, a baby girl who was born in 2007, suffers from severe skin rashes and has one leg longer than the other.

“We’ve decided to stop having babies. We don’t want any more, because it means new suffering and a new battle against new diseases,” Hussain said. “It is our bad luck. Maybe because we got married in the wrong time and in the wrong place.”

Falluja, in the desert province of Anbar, served as a base for Iraqi fighters after the 2003 US-led invasion, and witnessed two major conflicts in 2004. US troops used overwhelming force, tanks, fighter jets and helicopter gunships to crush insurgents there. …

Read on: www.iol.co.za/dailynews/news/birth-defects-rubble-scar-iraq-s-falluja-1.1194726

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