Vietnam, U.S. sign MOU on Agent Orange

Vietnam, U.S. sign MOU on Agent Orange

VIETNAM: The United States and Vietnam signed a memorandum of understanding on Sunday on a framework for research into the effects of the Vietnam War defoliant Agent Orange and its toxic component, dioxin.

A U.S. statement said the agreement was signed after a week of meetings in Hanoi by Anne Sassaman of the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and Nguyen Ngoc Sinh, director- general of Vietnam's National Environmental Agency.

U.S. forces dumped millions of gallons of Agent Orange on Vietnam during the war that ended in 1975 in order to deny communist soldiers jungle cover and food. Spraying was halted in 1971 after it was found it contained the most dangerous form of dioxin, TCDD, and caused cancer in rats.

Vietnam estimates more than a million of its people were exposed to the defoliant, which it blames for tens of thousands of birth defects and other diseases. --Reuters