A Danang resident catches fish and picks lotus stems from a lake which
is known to have high concentrations of dioxin from Agent Orange left behind by
the Americans
The United States and Vietnam on Thursday began cleaning up the toxic
chemical defoliant Agent Orange on part of Danang International Airport,
marking the first time Washington has been involved in cleaning up Agent Orange
in Vietnam.
The U.S. military sprayed up to
12 million gallons of the defoliant onto Vietnam's jungles over a 10-year
period during the Vietnam War, and the question of compensation for the
subsequent health problems is a major post-war issue.
Respiratory cancer and birth
defects amongst both Vietnamese and U.S. veterans have been linked to exposure
to Agent Orange.
"We are both moving earth
and taking the first steps to bury the legacies of our past," U.S.
Ambassador to Vietnam David Shear said at a ceremony at Danang airport on
Thursday.
"I look forward to even more
successes to follow."
The U.S. government is providing
$41 million to the project which will reduce the contamination level in 73,000
cubic metres of soil by late 2016, Nhan Dan daily said.
The contaminated soil and
sediment will be excavated and heated in a pile structure to a high temperature
to destroy the chemical, the U.S. embassy said in a statement on Thursday.
Vietnam's defence ministry has
cleared unexploded ordinance from the airport site, to allow the clean up, and
will built a power station to serve the project, said Shear.
Danang in Vietnam's central
region is a popular tourist destination. During the Vietnam War, that ended in
1975, the beach city was used as a recreational spot for U.S. soldiers.
The United States and Vietnam
were looking at a second cleanup site, Bien Hoa, in the southern province of
Dong Nai, said Shear.
The Bien Hoa airport is regarded
as another 'hotspot' for dioxin contamination, along with Phu Cat airport in
the central province of Binh Dinh.
The contamination level at Bien
Hoa airport is higher than Danang airport, but only a small area of Bien Hoa
has been buried to prevent the toxic waste spreading, the Ho Chi Minh City Law
newspaper said.
Reuters
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