ROME, Jan 3 (AFP) - NATO has agreed at Italy's urging to examine the alliance's use of depleted uranium munitions in the Balkans conflicts, thought to be linked to cancer and deaths of troops from Italy and several other NATO member states who served in the region.

The meeting of the North Atlantic Council, NATO's highest decision-making body, and the alliance's political committee will take place next Tuesday, the Italian foreign ministry announced Wednesday.

Six Italian soldiers who served in the Balkans have died of leukemia, prompting Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato to demand answers from NATO about the effects of using depleted uranium munitions.

Amato told La Repubblica newspaper that "NATO must carry out all the checks that will allow us to understand the history and the characteristics of depleted uranium." A feeling of alarm over the reports was "more than legitimate," he added.

"It's a very delicate question. The unquestioned solidarity with the alliance does not authorize it to remain silent or omit information," Amato said.

NATO has denied that depleted uranium (DU) used in some of its munitions could be linked to the deaths of military personnel. A spokesman at NATO headquarters in Mons, Belgium said in response: "Current research indicates it would be virtually impossible for a person to inhale enough depleted uranium particles for it to be a health risk."

While Rome adamantly insists there is a link between use of DU shells and the illnesses suffered by its troops, reports from other European countries that provided soldiers to NATO missions in Bosnia and Kosovo have been mixed.

In Belgium, five cases of cancer have been diagnosed in soldiers who served in the Balkans, but no link with the munitions has been established.

Several cases of leukemia have also been recorded amongst Dutch veterans of the Balkans wars, and Spain has launched an intensive medical examination of some 32,000 military personnel who were on duty there.

Portugal's army chief of staff said on Thursday that about 900 former peacekeepers would undergo medical tests to see if they had been exposed to radiation linked to depleted uranium munitions. But the government in Lisbon said Wednesday it would present parliament with classified NATO documents showing there were no risks of illness from the use of depleted uranium shells.

In Germany, a defence ministry spokesman told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper that tests carried out by the army on its Kosovo veterans over the past 12 months had not shown any radiation-linked illnesses.

The family of an Italian soldier who served in Bosnia-Hercegovina, 24-year-old Salvatore Carbonaro from Sicily, said Tuesday that he had died of leukemia in November. The dead soldier's brother, Mauro Carbonaro, told a regional newspaper that Salvatore had been in contact with DU munitions during his tour of duty in 1998 and 1999.

He was the sixth Italian soldier whose death has been linked to what has been called "Balkans syndrome" -- a series of health problems contracted by those who served in the former Yugoslavia. The Italian defence ministry has set up a commission to examine the possibility of a link between the deaths and cancer cases and the use of the depleted uranium.

Besides the six fatalities linked to the syndrome, the Italian press here has listed another 30 suspected cases of soldiers contaminated by DU.

Some 60,000 Italian troops and 15,000 Italian civilians have taken part in missions in the former Yugoslavia since 1995. NATO officials said last month that US aircraft fired more than 10,000 depleted uranium projectiles in Bosnia between 1994 and 1995, as well as in Kosovo in 1999.

They said that DU rounds were "fired from A-10 Thunderbolt aircraft, under international auspices," and that the fact had been known for several years.

A NATO official in Brussels added: "There is nothing secret about DU rounds being fired in Bosnia." Depleted uranium munitions are more dense than conventional ones, allowing them to penetrate heavy armour more easily. In addition to the Balkans, they were used in Iraq in 1991.