http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/02/international/europe/02MONT.html?ei=5040&en=5b7c72313eafa090&ex=1031630400&partner=MOREOVER&pagewanted=print&position=bottom
New York Times
International/Europe
September 2, 2002
On a Balkan War's Last Day, Trouble From the Sky
By MARLISE SIMONS
KOTOR, Montenegro - In the early morning
hours, the scientists come to work on a
small tongue of land with one of the loveliest
views along the Mediterranean.
Behind them is the stunning bay of Kotor
and its crown of steep mountains, ahead is the
shimmer of the open sea, a few hours' sail
from Italy.
But the men hunch down, their eyes fixed on
the ground. They scoop up bits of soil and
rock, moving slowly and meticulously like
archaeologists.
Protective clothing covers them from head to
toe. The cape, closed off to tourists, is
marked with signs saying "Radioactive Danger.
Trespassing Forbidden."
The scientists from Montenegro are searching
for war debris, specifically bullets coated
with slightly radioactive depleted uranium.
American warplanes fired some 480 rounds
at the cape on the final day of NATO's 1999
air campaign against Yugoslavia,
according to NATO records.
No one was killed. But to the scientists, the
attack is inexplicable. The only tokens of
past life are a collapsed bunker and some
ruined walls more than a century old,
leftovers from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
"We don't understand why anyone would
want to attack and contaminate the place on
the last day of the war," said Perko Vukotic,
a professor of nuclear physics at the
University of Montenegro at Podgorica who
heads the 12-man cleanup team.
The group has collected scores of bullets
and fragments, some buried deep in the soil.
But the main problem, they say, is that
casings have broken and many uranium parts
have disintegrated and turned into potentially
toxic dust.
"Water corrodes the uranium and it becomes
powdery," said Dr. Perkovic. "It crumbles
as easily as cigarette ash and spreads in
the soil. People can touch it or inhale it. The
wind blows it around."
The work in Montenegro, the little state that
with Serbia makes up the federation of
Yugoslavia, is the first thorough cleanup
of uranium in the Balkans.
NATO has disclosed that it fired thousands
of rounds of munitions with tips of depleted
uranium, one of the hardest metals and
therefore suitable for penetrating targets like
tanks, against targets in Bosnia in 1995 and
in Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro in 1999.
Depleted of its most radioactive part for use
in nuclear fuel, the material still emits
low-level radiation.
There have been heated debates in Europe
over the use of this ammunition in the
Balkans. The main concern was the risk
that the material could have lasting ill effects
on people and the environment.
Pentagon and officials from the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization acknowledge that
depleted uranium, like other heavy metals, can
be toxic, but insist that its low-level
radiation is not harmful.
Many civilian specialists agree, but some
research in the United States, Canada and
Britain has shown that uranium particles can
be inhaled, enter the bloodstream and
lodge in the bone, where they can deliver
low but steady and potentially harmful
radiation. There is no agreement on what
is a harmful dose and some NATO countries
want the ammunition banned.
"We had to make a choice because nobody
knows the truth," Dr. Vukotic said. "Either
we say nothing about this and close Cape
Arza. Or we decontaminate it." Industries that
handle depleted uranium use special precautions
to store it, he went on, so here it
should not be lying around.
The team is closely following the recommendations
of the United Nations Environment
Program, which conducted the only
comprehensive study of the Balkan wars'
environmental impact. In one of its reports,
it said that "given the considerable scientific
uncertainties" about long-term behavior of
depleted uranium, the authorities should give
the "highest priority" to forbidding public
access, collecting and removing pieces and
decontaminating areas where possible and
store the material safely. Ground water
should be monitored. The latest report, in
March, said that, surprisingly, depleted
uranium particles were "still in the air two
years after the conflict's end."
The decontamination team began work on
the cape last year. The men move slowly,
covering about 60 feet an hour, their instruments
close to the ground. When a counter
detects higher than natural radiation, the
place is marked with a little yellow flag.
Someone scoops up the soil and the stones.
Each spoonful is put under the detector,
then stored in boxes or bags, depending on
its intensity.
"It's very tedious, it's like detective work," Dr. Vukotic said.
No one lives on the cape, but villagers have
houses about a mile away and tourists
visiting the ancient town of Kotor nearby
come to hike here and visit the beaches.
The team has sent its first cache - 160 large
bullets, scores of fragments, more than
100 pounds of depleted uranium and three
tons of low-level radioactive soil - in bags
and boxes to Belgrade for temporary storage
at the site of a research reactor. They
estimate it will be twice that amount when
they finish this fall.
"We have no proper place to store this
waste and we have to pay for this," said Ana
Misurovitc, director of the Montenegro
Toxicological Institute. The attack, she also
noted, was May 30, 1999, the last day of
the war. "Why did they bother then? It has
already cost us more than half a million
dollars in salaries, materials, equipment and
storage, and we're not finished." This is a
lot, she said, for a government with a budget
of $300 million.
In Brussels, a NATO spokesman said that
"480 rounds were fired at a legitimate target
on the cape, but we do not keep the targeting
records."
Villagers said that there was nothing to attack
and that they had not seen soldiers
around the site for more than a decade. A
Western military official said he believed the
site had a surveillance radar, but conceded
this would have drawn fire at the start and
not at the end of the air campaign.
Serbia was hit by some 3,500 rounds of depleted
uranium and its cleanup has only just
begun. But Montenegrins feel wronged, Ms.
Misurovitc explained, because they made it
clear they were neutral in the war.
She has tried to enlist the help of the United
Nations and other international bodies with
the uranium. Her message for NATO: "Come
and take back your radioactive waste and
pay for decontamination."
New York Times
International/Europe
September 2, 2002
On a Balkan War's Last Day, Trouble From the Sky
By MARLISE SIMONS
KOTOR, Montenegro - In the early morning
hours, the scientists come to work on a
small tongue of land with one of the loveliest
views along the Mediterranean.
Behind them is the stunning bay of Kotor
and its crown of steep mountains, ahead is the
shimmer of the open sea, a few hours' sail
from Italy.
But the men hunch down, their eyes fixed on
the ground. They scoop up bits of soil and
rock, moving slowly and meticulously like
archaeologists.
Protective clothing covers them from head to
toe. The cape, closed off to tourists, is
marked with signs saying "Radioactive Danger.
Trespassing Forbidden."
The scientists from Montenegro are searching
for war debris, specifically bullets coated
with slightly radioactive depleted uranium.
American warplanes fired some 480 rounds
at the cape on the final day of NATO's 1999
air campaign against Yugoslavia,
according to NATO records.
No one was killed. But to the scientists, the
attack is inexplicable. The only tokens of
past life are a collapsed bunker and some
ruined walls more than a century old,
leftovers from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
"We don't understand why anyone would
want to attack and contaminate the place on
the last day of the war," said Perko Vukotic,
a professor of nuclear physics at the
University of Montenegro at Podgorica who
heads the 12-man cleanup team.
The group has collected scores of bullets
and fragments, some buried deep in the soil.
But the main problem, they say, is that
casings have broken and many uranium parts
have disintegrated and turned into potentially
toxic dust.
"Water corrodes the uranium and it becomes
powdery," said Dr. Perkovic. "It crumbles
as easily as cigarette ash and spreads in
the soil. People can touch it or inhale it. The
wind blows it around."
The work in Montenegro, the little state that
with Serbia makes up the federation of
Yugoslavia, is the first thorough cleanup
of uranium in the Balkans.
NATO has disclosed that it fired thousands
of rounds of munitions with tips of depleted
uranium, one of the hardest metals and
therefore suitable for penetrating targets like
tanks, against targets in Bosnia in 1995 and
in Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro in 1999.
Depleted of its most radioactive part for use
in nuclear fuel, the material still emits
low-level radiation.
There have been heated debates in Europe
over the use of this ammunition in the
Balkans. The main concern was the risk
that the material could have lasting ill effects
on people and the environment.
Pentagon and officials from the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization acknowledge that
depleted uranium, like other heavy metals, can
be toxic, but insist that its low-level
radiation is not harmful.
Many civilian specialists agree, but some
research in the United States, Canada and
Britain has shown that uranium particles can
be inhaled, enter the bloodstream and
lodge in the bone, where they can deliver
low but steady and potentially harmful
radiation. There is no agreement on what
is a harmful dose and some NATO countries
want the ammunition banned.
"We had to make a choice because nobody
knows the truth," Dr. Vukotic said. "Either
we say nothing about this and close Cape
Arza. Or we decontaminate it." Industries that
handle depleted uranium use special precautions
to store it, he went on, so here it
should not be lying around.
The team is closely following the recommendations
of the United Nations Environment
Program, which conducted the only
comprehensive study of the Balkan wars'
environmental impact. In one of its reports,
it said that "given the considerable scientific
uncertainties" about long-term behavior of
depleted uranium, the authorities should give
the "highest priority" to forbidding public
access, collecting and removing pieces and
decontaminating areas where possible and
store the material safely. Ground water
should be monitored. The latest report, in
March, said that, surprisingly, depleted
uranium particles were "still in the air two
years after the conflict's end."
The decontamination team began work on
the cape last year. The men move slowly,
covering about 60 feet an hour, their instruments
close to the ground. When a counter
detects higher than natural radiation, the
place is marked with a little yellow flag.
Someone scoops up the soil and the stones.
Each spoonful is put under the detector,
then stored in boxes or bags, depending on
its intensity.
"It's very tedious, it's like detective work," Dr. Vukotic said.
No one lives on the cape, but villagers have
houses about a mile away and tourists
visiting the ancient town of Kotor nearby
come to hike here and visit the beaches.
The team has sent its first cache - 160 large
bullets, scores of fragments, more than
100 pounds of depleted uranium and three
tons of low-level radioactive soil - in bags
and boxes to Belgrade for temporary storage
at the site of a research reactor. They
estimate it will be twice that amount when
they finish this fall.
"We have no proper place to store this
waste and we have to pay for this," said Ana
Misurovitc, director of the Montenegro
Toxicological Institute. The attack, she also
noted, was May 30, 1999, the last day of
the war. "Why did they bother then? It has
already cost us more than half a million
dollars in salaries, materials, equipment and
storage, and we're not finished." This is a
lot, she said, for a government with a budget
of $300 million.
In Brussels, a NATO spokesman said that
"480 rounds were fired at a legitimate target
on the cape, but we do not keep the targeting
records."
Villagers said that there was nothing to attack
and that they had not seen soldiers
around the site for more than a decade. A
Western military official said he believed the
site had a surveillance radar, but conceded
this would have drawn fire at the start and
not at the end of the air campaign.
Serbia was hit by some 3,500 rounds of depleted
uranium and its cleanup has only just
begun. But Montenegrins feel wronged, Ms.
Misurovitc explained, because they made it
clear they were neutral in the war.
She has tried to enlist the help of the United
Nations and other international bodies with
the uranium. Her message for NATO: "Come
and take back your radioactive waste and
pay for decontamination."