Hanoi meeting probes "last ghost" of Vietnam war: Agent Orange
Subject: Your "Registered" POISONS Are Just Making Our Planet "Cleaner, Safer, Purer and/or More Healthy".....................
Date: Tue, 5 Mar 2002 10:30:14 -0500
From: Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Paul Helliker <phelliker@cdpr.ca.gov>
Director, State of
California, Department of Pesticide Regulation
cc: Christine Whitman whitman.christine@epa.gov
Dear Mr. Helliker, I thought you would like to read the following article:
UPDATE - Hanoi meeting probes "last ghost" of Vietnam war
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/14852/story.htm
[Please visit the original website to view the whole article.]
HANOI - U.S. and Vietnamese government scientists and international experts met on the weekend to discuss effects of the toxic defoliant Agent Orange, called the "last significant ghost" of the Vietnam War by the U.S. ambassador.
The three-day meeting in Hanoi will look at what is known about Agent Orange and its major contaminants - highly poisonous dioxins - and consider future research needs.
The issue is a tricky one for the United States, which has faced compensation demands from both Hanoi and U.S. veterans for exposure to toxic defoliants, sprayed to deny communist soldiers jungle cover during the Vietnam War which ended in 1975.
U.S. forces dumped millions of gallons of defoliants on Vietnam from 1962 to 1971. Spraying was halted after it was discovered that Agent Orange, which contained the most dangerous form of dioxin TCDD, caused cancer in rats.
Vietnam estimates that more than a million of its people were exposed to the spraying, which it blames for tens of thousands of birth defects, incidences of cancer and other illnesses. Washington argues the scientific evidence is inconclusive and more research is needed.
U.S. ambassador Raymond Burghardt called the Agent Orange issue "the one significant ghost" from the war as Hanoi and Washington moved on in their relationship. ... COMPENSATION CLAIMS
Conference chairman Christopher Portier, of the U.S. government's National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, said: "Much of (Vietnam's) research is unpublished and we hear about it in sketchy pieces and parts."
He added research on dioxin in Vietnam was also important for the rest of the world. ... "U.S.-Vietnam relations were normalised in 1995 after Vietnam dropped claims of war reparations/compensation," it said. "At the time of normalisation, neither compensation nor reparations were granted or contemplated for the future."
Asked if this could change depending on research, an embassy spokesman said: "I think the statement speaks for itself." ... Story by David Brunnstrom - REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
Well Mr. Helliker, Admiral Hyman Rickover, the outspoken father of the nuclear submarine, described the monotonously repeated tactics used by those with a vested interest in harmful technology. "First you confuse the issue by arguing as if a law of science were at issue when, in fact, the proposed legislation deals with technology, not science. Second, when this logic fails, the need for legislation is categorically denied. Warnings of scientists are rejected as anecdotal, unproven and exaggerated. Third, when it turns out that the scientists were right after all, the argument shifts from the question of technological harm to the legitimacy of any kind of protective legislation, such as the violation of basic liberties and government tyranny. Fourth, when all else fails and protective legislation is imminent, create urgent demands for more research to prove the appositeness of the proposed law." If the USA would admit it did something wrong with your "registered" POISONS "here", I firmly believe that "you" would have to pay compensations and reparations for all of the resulting "registered" CONTAMINATION your "registered" POISONS have caused virtually everywhere!
Respectfully, Stephen L. Tvedten
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