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UK Denies Nerve Gas Tests
On Soldiers After 1960s

10-13-2

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain, which acknowledges having tested deadly Sarin nerve gas on soldiers in the 1950s and 1960s, denied a Sunday newspaper report that the tests had continued until as late as 1983.
 
The Sunday Telegraph said it had seen British Defense Ministry documents which showed that the chemical warfare agent was tested on a soldier in 1983, and that he was denied an antidote by scientists studying the chemical's effects.
 
But a British Defense Ministry spokesman, asked if Sarin had been used in 1983, told Reuters: "It was not."
 
"It was used in the 50s and 60s. That is part of the public record," the spokesman said.
 
The Sunday Telegraph said it had seen the documents, which it said would be made public in two months, when 500 ex-servicemen launched a legal case against the authorities, claiming they had been used as human guinea pigs.
 
The Defense Ministry says it has seen no evidence that soldiers who participated in experiments at the Porton Down research center have suffered long-term health problems, but is cooperating with a two-year inquiry into the practice.
 
People exposed to small quantities of Sarin suffer symptoms including difficulty in breathing, nausea, jerking, staggering and loss of bladder and bowel control. Exposure is frequently fatal.
 
One Porton Down test subject, Ronald Maddison, died in 1953.
 
Maddison's death was ruled a "misadventure" at the time, but Britain's top legal adviser, the attorney general, has given permission for a second inquest to be held five decades later.
 
Servicemen say they hope to show that Maddison died as a result of an illegal Sarin test.
 
 
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