Wednesday, January 10 12:27 AM SGT
Germany to investigate alleged US exercises with DU munitions

BERLIN, Jan 9 (AFP) - The German defense ministry said on Tuesday it would investigate reports that the United States and other allies may have fired depleted uranium (DU) munitions at their bases in the country. The ministry said in a statement it would probe "which munitions have been employed by allies' troops at bases in Germany."

"The defense ministry is interested in the quickest possible explanation of the matter and will release information on the results immediately," it added.

A spokeswoman for US troops in Germany dismissed media reports that US soldiers had possibly fired DU ammunition during exercises at the Baumholder and Grafenwoehr bases in southern Germany but acknowledged such munitions were stockpiled at US bases.

Speaking in the western city of Heidelberg, she said the munitions were only used in combat and not in exercises. She declined to say where the ammunition was stored in Germany.

Munitions are tipped with depleted uranium so they can penetrate heavy armor, but some scientists fear that servicemen exposed to the slightly radioactive dust they emit on impact could contract cancer. The US has said its troops fired around 31,000 DU projectiles during NATO operations in Bosnia and Kosovo.

The German news agency DPA on Tuesday quoted government sources who said Germany would urge the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to introduce a temporary moratorium on the use of DU weapons until it was known whether or not they pose a health risk.

NATO ambassadors met Tuesday in Brussels to investigate a possible link between cases of leukemia among NATO troops who had served in the Balkans and the soldiers' possible exposure to DU munitions.  Bernhard Gertz, chairman of the German Army Federation which represents soldiers' interests, said that he assumed US troops had used the controversial munitions during exercises on German soil.  Gertz added that former Soviet troops stationed in Germany had stockpiled such ammunition and questioned whether their bases in what was East Germany might be contaminated. However, the defense ministry in Moscow denied that the Soviet army had used DU weapons in Germany.

A British army spokeswoman in Germany said that while British troops use DU munitions, none were fired in Germany. Meanwhile, the Union of German Police Officers called on Interior Minister Otto Schily to have the 600 officers who served in the Balkans tested for leukemia.

The interior ministry said all police officers had been warned of the potential dangers of DU ammunition before they were sent to the Balkans and that they had received routine medical examinations since their return, with no cases of leukemia reported.

Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping said this week that it was not necessary to test the 60,000 soldiers who had served in the Balkans because a link has not been proved between ammunition tipped with depleted uranium and cancer.

He is to meet with medical and scientific experts on the health risks of DU munitions on Wednesday in Berlin.