Date: Sun, 9 Sep 2001
13:39:28 +0100 (BST)
From: davey garland <thunderelf@yahoo.co.uk>
Reply-To: du-list@yahoogroups.com
To:
du-list@yahoogroups.com
This article has not long been
translated, and some of the data was presented in
March at a du conference
Reporter, Banja Luka, Republika Srpska, B-H March 27, 2001
Balkan Syndrome
ACQUITTAL WITHOUT INVESTIGATION
To the question regarding his
views about the most
recent UN expert reports Dr.
Zdrale answers that those experts did not
deign to come to the Kasindol
hospital, examine the patients and check
the data collected by the local
medical staff
by Zoran Zuza
A few weeks ago NATO greeted
with relief the reports of the United
Nations experts and several
independent laboratories in Switzerland
regarding the use of depleted
uranium ammunition during the military
interventions in Bosnia and
Kosovo.
Regardless of contradictory and
partly even political qualifications contained in
these reports, NATO welcomed
the analyses according to which the risk
posed by the use of such ammunition
for the Alliance soldiers and the
local population is "insignificant"
and put the whole affair, as expected,
in the "closed case" file with
the decision to continue to use that
type of ammunition in future
military actions. In the general
trouble caused by the Albanians
in the south of Serbia and now in
western Macedonia the news about
the victims of the Balkans syndrome
have disappeared from the news,
while absolutely no one remembered to
ask the United Nations expert
to explain the meaning of formulations
such as "from the scientific
point of view uncertainty remains"
regarding the long-term effects
of the depleted uranium ammunition.
Perhaps the said experts will
use exactly this sentence as cover in
some future court cases against
those who ordered the use of depleted
uranium ammunition in Bosnia
and Kosovo, as the most recent data about
the number of registered cases
of cancer and death rate among
Sarajevo Serbs given to Reporter
in Kasin Dol hospital, indicate that
without doubt a crime against
civilian population and soldiers of the Army
of Srpska was committed in this
region. What is crime: Director of
the clinical-hospital center
in Serb Sarajevo Dr. Slavko Zdrale presented
data that leave one dumbfounded.
In that hospital, in the last three
years, all together 639 patients
with malignant tumors have been
registered. Out of them, 211
died in the same period!
"We in the hospital tried to
find an answer to the question what
could cause such an increase
in malignant tumors in the
population in the last five
years, but we failed to prove any causal
link with any of the considered
possible causes. The only possible
cause of these cancers is the
depleted uranium ammunition, since
almost all the diseased were
either present or lived in the territory
exposed to NATO bombing. It
is important to mention that the number of
cancerous diseases has significantly
increased in the last three
years and that it hasn't dropped
in the January and February of this
year," says Dr. Zdrale, a surgeon
with 25 years of experience.
He emphasizes that a large group
of specialists from Kasin Dol
hospital has prepared two scientific
studies about the effects of
uranium and plutonium on human
health and about malignant
diseases in the Sarajevo-Romanija
region.
Besides horrific statistics,
the studies describe "medical rarities",
unprecedented in the medical
practice. Several patients had double,
even triple malignant tumors
in different types of tissue, tumors
that were independent of each
other. "I have never seen
such cases in my entire life
and all these years of medical work,"
emphasizes Dr. Zdrale and again
stresses that all those patients come
from the territory bombed by
the depleted uranium ammunition.
Chimneys in the ground: Zeljko
Samardzic (1967) had cancer of the
large intestine removed in December
1999. In February 2000 he started
loosing balance and had to resort
to a wheel chair.
In April 2000 a malignant tumor
size of an apple was removed from his
adrenal gland.
In may 2000, fingers of his
left hand started to deform. Skin was
pealing off, nails fell off,
and doctors diagnosed gangrene and
amputated the small finger on
his left hand.
The Samardzic family has been
living near Sarajevo for more than a hundred
years. They mostly died from
natural causes and no one in the
family has ever had a malignant
tumor. Zaljko's father and mother are
in their 70's. He has a wife
and three children. He says that before
the war he did not have any
serious sickness and explains that by the
fact that as a forester he spent
a lot of time in the wilderness and
walked 20 to 30 kilometers daily.
He continued with the same work
during the war but, depending
on the situation, he had to spend some
time in the trenches, where
he was during the NATO bombardment.
"There were about fifteen of
us, some 50 to 100 meters from the spot
where the bombs hit. At that
time we had no idea what sort of weapon
that was, and some of us even
picked up pieces of shrapnel as
souvenirs," says Samardzic and
adds that two other soldiers from that
unit have already died from
cancer - Desimir Divljan and Dorde Jokic.
Jovan Jeftic (1930), whose house
was near the bombed spot, also
recently died form cancer.
Now, after everything he's been
through, Samardzic feels well. He
realizes that he is a victim
of the "Balkans Syndrome", and when he
read the story about Sladjana
Sarenac, the girl form Hadzici who
played with the soil on the
edges of a crater made by a depleted
uranium bomb, whose nails also
fell off, he recalled that he and his
comrades dug soil in craters
with their bare hands.
Provocation from Brussels: As
a striking example of
the effect of the "Balkans Syndrome",
in early March Samardzic traveled
to Brussels together with two
doctors from Srpska. They were
invited to a gathering dedicated
to the victims of the depleted uranium
ammunition by a Belgian non-governmental
organization led by a
pacifist and publicist Michel
Colon. Dr. Dragutin Ilic and Dr.
Trifko Guzina, as well as Snezana
Pavlovic from the [Nuclear Physics]
Institute in Vinca [near Belgrade]
were also in Brussels.
"There were invited experts and
victims of the 'Balkans syndrome' at
the gathering, but there were
no NATO representatives. As far as I
understood, Colon and his organization
are not exactly favorites of
the Alliance officials. Besides
me there were sick soldiers from
different countries, an Englishman
who was in the Gulf War, a
Frenchman and two Belgians who
served in Bosnia-Hercegovina and a
journalist from Spain whose
fiance died from cancer.
During the gathering they said
that NATO is making sure that they
have all sorts of assistance
and that their families are taken care
of, but on the condition that
they keep quiet. According to what they
said, if any member of the family
publicly complains or files a
suit for damages, they immediately
lose all their benefits. That is how
NATO is trying to suppress the
information about the 'Balkans
syndrome'," says Samardzic.
He adds that already on the first
day of the gathering
a German journalist, whose name
he does not recall, tried to
provoke him by asking him whether
the Serb Army used depleted uranium
in Srebrenica during, as she
said, genocide of Muslims. "A similar
commentary came at the end of
an article of an Independent, London,
journalist who interviewed me
and who wrote that it should be kept in
mind that I was a member of
an aggressor army that carried out
genocide in Srebrenica.
All of that upset me immensely
and I decided to stop giving statements
for newspapers. I have never
seen Srebrenica, except on a map, in my
whole life. My comrades from
the unit and I defended our houses and
land."
"NATO keeps denying the existence
of the 'Balkans syndrome'. It
should be proven what they did
here, and thereby the use of
such ammunition elsewhere in
the world should be prevented."
Dr. Trifko Guzina, a pre-war
director of the kidney disease clinic in
Sarajevo and a surgeon who operated
on 25,000 patients before the
war, also claims that Samardzija
is a victim of the depleted uranium
ammunition. "Such cases are
simply unknown in medical literature;
that patient is overwhelmed
by illness in such a manner, in good health
and without a hereditary factor..."
He warns that one of the conclusions
of the gathering was that
decontamination of the soil
and water should be urgently carried out
in this region because, as Dr.
Guzina stresses, everyone is in
danger, including the inhabitants
of the Sarajevo canton.
The Association for the Prevention
of Use of Depleted Uranium in War
has also been founded and immediately
demanded that investigation of
the effects of that matter on
human body be unified.
To the question regarding his
views about the most recent UN expert
reports Dr. Zdrale answers that
those experts did not deign to come
to Kasin Dol hospital, examine
the patients and check the
data collected by the local
medical staff.
Dr. Nemanja Veljkov, specialist
for diseases of blood
and liver, facing in the Kasin
Dol hospital numerous cases of
acute leukemia, especially among
children, at a press conference a
month ago said that the truth
about the "Balkans syndrome" is hidden
exactly in that hospital and
in the territory of Serb Sarajevo. All
those who for whatever reason
are now trying to suppress that truth
should be reminded that crimes
do not disappear, and when
justice catches up with the
culprits, someone will also remember their
accomplices.
Data about number of malignant
cancers in Kasindol Hospital
1995 - 43 patients - 22 died
1996 - 93 patients - 36 died
1997 - 95 patients - 37 died
1998 - 175 patients - 94 died
1999 - 216 patients - 44 died
2000 - 240 patients - 73 died
Leukemia
Between 1996 and 2000 there
were 18 deaths caused by acute leukemia
in Kasindol hospital. The illness
was not picky so that
the dead include a four-year-old
boy, a girl aged 15, a boy aged 16 and
a young male aged 23. Since
1998 another 40 patients with illnesses
of blood and lymph nodes have
been treated in the hospital. 19 of
them suffer from leukemia, two
from its acute form. The latter two are
children from Pale, aged eight
and eleven.
Translated on August 1, 2001
naar bovenkant pagina
What
is 'Depleted Uranium'
Dutch homepage.
The VISIE Foundation