On depleted uranium

After numerous articles on yet another western post-war syndrome, and just as I was about to give up my last shred of hope for the so-called "free media", I finally got to read a line or two about the fate of ordinary people living in areas affected by "humanitarian bombing". One single paragraph in one out of more than a dozen articles mentions that, since the conflict, there has been no increase in the number of cancer cases among the general population in Kosovo. There! So now, nobody can claim that the West is only concerned about the well-being of westerners.

But then a question arises: on what data did they base this comparison? It is a well-established fact that the ethnic Albanian population of Kosovo had boycotted all Yugoslav official institutions, health care services included, for most of the last 10 years. Consequently, there is no statistical base on which to make comparisons of the current number of cancer cases. So this paragraph turns out to be just another apologetic statement in line with official (western) policy of "whatever we do, we are always doing the right thing to protect democracy and human rights".

Further proof of this is the 200 percent increase of cancer cases in the ethnic Serbian portion of the population in Kosovo, even after this population was decimated after the arrival of the "Kosovo Protection Force" (KFOR), as stated by a report from the only remaining Serb-run hospital in Kosovo (in the northern town of Kosovska Mitrovica), and as reported by the Yugoslav media.

Another question also arises, although not in the western media: if more than 30,000 pieces of DU-enriched armor-piercing (my emphasis) ammunition had been used over Yugoslavia and the number of targets hit (tanks and armored personnel carriers) is very close to zero (as reported even by Western media), then what was the real target?

And finally the most important question of them all: when will we see the day when the western media stops being a mere propaganda tool of their governments and starts doing their job properly?

BRANIMIR SALEVIC

Tangerang, Banten