Brussels - NATO said yesterday it was starting a broad-based health study to investigate complaints by troops who served in the Balkans that they had contracted cancer from exposure to depleted uranium rounds used there. But at a press conference following Monday's meeting of NATO's top medical officers it restated its claim that depleted uranium rounds do not cause cancer.
"All the data we have at our disposal indicate no link whatsoever between depleted uranium and cancer," said Col David Lam, NATO's chief medical officer.
"We have nonetheless decided to launch an epidemiological study by member-states to respond to complaints by troops who served in Balkans operations, but we cannot at this point speak of anything like a Balkans syndrome," said a NATO spokesman, Mr Mark Laity.