Ruling Gives Army Right to Incinerate Chemical Weapons

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> Ruling Gives Army Right to Incinerate Chemical Weapons

>

> By DAVID STOUT

>

> WASHINGTON, Aug. 8 A federal judge cleared the way today for the Army to

> begin burning thousands of shells and rockets loaded with deadly

chemicals,

> rejecting the pleas of environmental and civil rights groups for an

> injunction to stop the incineration.

>

> Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson of Federal District Court here ruled that

the

> plaintiffs had failed to show that the incineration of the cold-war-era

> ordnance at a base in northeastern Alabama represented an imminent danger.

>

> Shortly after the ruling, the Army said it would begin on Saturday to

> destroy the shells and rockets full of nerve gas, mustard gas and other

> deadly agents in furnaces at the Anniston Army Depot, an 18,000-acre base

> some 50 miles east of Birmingham.

>

> The process is expected to take seven years, the Army has said.

>

> " Public safety remains our principal interest, " Les Brownlee, the acting

> Army secretary, said in a statement. " The Army has demonstrated since 1990

> that it can safely destroy these chemical munitions, having already

> destroyed over 8,000 tons of chemical agent and over 1.3 million munitions

> without harming human health or the environment. "

>

> Despite such assurances, the Army's plans have aroused alarm among the

> 24,000 people in the nearby city of Anniston, as well as others in the

> region. Many say they are not convinced that the burning is safe and that

> no deadly fumes will be released.

>

> Judge Jackson's ruling stirred dismay among the 21 environmental and

rights

> groups that wanted to block the burning. " It's a sad day, " Craig Williams,

> the executive director of the Chemical Weapons Working Group, said in a

> telephone interview from the group's headquarters in Berea, Ky.

>

> Mr. Williams said the plaintiffs would confer over the weekend on what to

> do next.

> http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/09/politics/09DEPO.html?th

>