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Environmental costs of the war on Lebanon
11/Sep/2006: The Lebanese government has said that more civilians would die of the pollution caused by the month long war in Lebanon, in the months to come. Highly poisonous clouds that arose from a 12-day fire in a bombed fuel tank has spread over a third of the country and the cloud contains high levels of lead, mercury and the most dangerous polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB’s). PCB’s are stable organic compounds that are known to cause cancer in humans.
The people in the affected areas have been breathing this toxic mixture for over a month now and the toxins in the cloud could mix with rain in the days to come and seep in to the soil contaminating the water table. If this happens more Lebanese civilians could be poisoned by the toxins in their drinking water. Studies have shown that toxins like lead, mercury and PCB’s can make people infertile and can induce cancer.
The oil slick in the eastern Mediterranean, which resulted from a generator oil spill from a power plant stuck by Israeli missiles during the war, is posing yet another threat to the people living along the coasts of the affected areas. The Lebanese government has blamed that the environmental damage in Lebanon was deliberately caused by Israel in breach of the war rules laid by the Geneva Convention and the International Criminal Court. Israel has denied the acquisitions made by the Lebanese government saying that they were only targeting Hezbollah positions and not civilian areas in Lebanon, during the war.
The actual environmental costs of this war will only become evident in the months to come.
Kesavan Siva
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