Press Release
Malu‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action (HI)
February 5, 2014
Army to bomb known DU contaminated areas at Schofield (Big Island next?)
According to the nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) the Army will be using high explosives in known Depleted Uranium (DU) contaminated areas at Schofield Barracks on Oahu during the week of Feb. 4-11, 2014. (See below) The NRC has given the go ahead even though the NRC has said it has not completed it's review of the Army's air monitoring plan. In effect "the residents and visitors on Oahu are being used as lab rats for continued military experiments," said peace activist, Jim Albertini. Albertini continued, "the U.S. military is the greatest polluter the world has ever known and the so called regulators like the NRC, instead of regulating, are complicit in this pollution and disregard for the health and safety of the people the military and NRC are charged with protecting" Albertini continued, "it is criminal to allow high explosives to be used in known DU contaminated areas. Neither the Army nor the NRC know how much DU contamination exists at Schofield, Pohakuloa on Hawaii island, and other ranges in Hawaii and elsewhere. No comprehensive, independent testing and monitoring has been done to make this determination. To bomb these areas is reckless and amounts to government terrorism on its own population."
Albertini said, all NRC and Army officials complicit in this bombing on known DU areas, should be prosecuted locally for terroristic threatening and brought before an international Nuremberg war crimes type tribunal and tried for crimes against humanity. The world is in terrible shape with toxic pollution, climate change, etc. because the precautionary principle has not followed."
Albertini said, two Hilo High School students were just arrested for suspected terroristic threatening for setting off a small plastic bottle explosive device, but the Army can bomb known DU contaminated areas with high explosives that risk spreading the contamination around the island and that's OK?
Albertini wrote the NRC and said, "I protest your actions. I have zero confidence in the NRC and the Army to act in the interest of the health and safety of the people of Hawaii." Albertini added, "the history of military pollution in Hawaii and abuse of the land and sea, and all it's life give witness to this conclusion of zero confidence."
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