New evidence of experiments in which British servicemen had to crawl through radioactive contamination from nuclear explosions to test the effectiveness of protective clothing has discredited the government's oft-repeated insistence that people were never used as radiological guinea pigs.

The revelation has emerged as governments in Britain and New Zealand come under renewed legal pressure from veterans who believe that the radiation they were exposed to during nuclear tests in the 1950s and 60s made them sick. New court challenges for compensation have just been launched in both countries.

"They think that just because they write on official headed paper we will believe everything they say," said Sheila Gray, secretary of the British Nuclear Tests Veterans Association. "But when we dig deeper and find out for ourselves we discover that they do not always tell the truth. They cover up the truth."

The Ministry of Defence has always maintained that any experiments that were done on the effects of nuclear explosions on humans used lifelike dummies instead of real people.

This line was heavily relied upon in 1997 by lawyers defending the MoD in the European Court of Human Rights against compensation claims from veterans. It was repeated in January this year in a response to the Veterans Association from defence minister Lewis Moonie.

"I must first reject your contention that nuclear test veterans are victims of nuclear weapons," said the Kirkcaldy Labour MP. "The implication in your statement is that those who participated in the UK's atmospheric nuclear tests programme were deliberately exposed to ionising radiation, which is simply not the case."

But now the Sunday Herald has uncovered evidence that casts serious doubt on the assertion. Two dozen soldiers were asked to drive, march or crawl through a fall-out zone three days after a nuclear explosion in the Australian desert in 1956. "The object," according to an official account, "was to discover what types of clothing would give the best protection against radioactive contamination in conditions of warfare."

The story has surfaced because in February Sue Rabbitt Roff, a radiation researcher at Dundee University's Centre for Medical Education, came across a reference to "clothing trials" in a military memo from an Australian government archive. The memo said that people who took part in these trials had been exposed to radiation during nuclear tests. Roff thought that this contradicted the MoD's denials that men had been used as guinea pigs.

"I was in the court in 1997 when the government denied using humans [in] studies of the effects of radiation," said Roff. "In fact the government said it would be 'an act of indefensible callousness to have done so'."

The Australian document confirms that servicemen did suffer radiation exposure in the clothing trails, argues Roff. "This was perhaps a necessary part of Cold War defence but to deny that such experiments happened is to demean the role of the servicemen and to deny their claim to the duty of care owed by governments."

When the Sunday Herald queried the MoD about the trials, it made contact with the Australian government and eventually confirmed that "contaminated clothing trials" involving 24 men wearing three different types of protective clothing from an "Indoctrinee Force" of over 250 British, Australian and New Zealand officers and civilians had taken place. "Officers moved in groups through a fall-out area three days after the detonation," said an account provided by the ministry. A spokesman , however, insisted that the men were not guinea pigs. "They were told of the purpose of the experiment and were closely monitored to ensure [they were not] exposed to dangerous levels of radiation."

This will not satisfy the veterans. "These tests were horrendous. They blow apart the idea that there were no tests done on individuals," responded Ian Greenhalgh, a Wigan-based lawyer who represents more than 20 veterans.

"This is another example where there have been consistent denials and then admissions. How much remains to be uncovered?"

Although the MoD successfully defended itself in Strasbourg, it is now facing another legal action from the widow of a pilot who flew through a mushroom cloud from a nuclear test in 1958. Shirley Denson, whose husband, Eric, committed suicide after suffering from years of depression, has just won legal aid to sue the government.

Three New Zealander veterans of British tests have also launched a multi-million pound claim for damages against the New Zealand government, claiming that radiation gave them, their children and their grandchildren diseases and disabilities.

In one respect at least the MoD may be right, admitted the British Veterans Association's Sheila Gray. "The men were not proper guinea pigs because they were not tested afterwards. They were sacrificial lambs ."

Coloured rain dust from Sahara Desert is still radioactive
  C. Papastefanou, M. Manolopoulou, S. Stoulos, A. Ioannidou, E.
  Gerasopoulos - Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, 02034, Vol 55 Iss 1, 2001

La linea dei governi è sempre la stessa: negare, negare sempre. Nel caso vengano messi di fronte a prove inoppugnabili, allora minimizzare. E non è che istituzioni tipo CNR, ENEA o ANPA si diano un gran daffare per dirci come stanno le cose. Basti pensare che a nessuna è ancora "venuto in mente" di raccogliere le prove per chiedere i danni subiti dalla popolazione. O sono con noi, o contro di noi.