There have been increasing calls for the establishment of an International Tribunal to bring Saddam Hussein and his supporters, both inside and outside of Iraq, to justice for the use of WMD against both Iran and the Iraqi Kurdish population. Additionally, UNSCOM requested a complete accounting from Saddam on his CW attacks via airstrikes against Iran and the Kurds. UNSCOM, with this information, could help establish the total amount of chemical agent used vice estimated production, and, thus the veracity of Iraq’s claims on destruction of various agent stocks.

Knowing that Iraq would not be forthcoming on this request, ASA dug into its archives and provided the following information to an UNSCOM representative. You will note that at the beginning of the CW campaign, information on specifics was scarce. This changed with time as the number and intensity of Iraq CW attacks increased.

In addition to the above listed Iraqi attacks with chemical warfare agent, ASA did not list 51 attacks (after 1981) in which neither the number of casualties nor type of agent could be identified. ASA has had this information since 1989 and we are sure there is later information available that would further define the agents used and numbers of casualties identified, which we assume would be much higher.

We do know that Iran suffered in excess of 100,000 CW casualties and they are today flight following over 30,000 victims with regularly scheduled medical examinations and provision of required health care. As more CW victims are identified, health status and required care determined and long term rehabilitation programs established, their records are entered into the data base. The Iranian data base in this area is invaluable to the world body. Unfortunately, Iran has had to shoulder this Iraq induced burden without assistance or even offers of assistance from this same world body.

The CBMTS has been fortunate in that Iranian medical and science professionals continue to share their data base with the rest of the CBMTS members at each primary CBMTS meeting - the next being CBMTS III at the AC Laboratorium in Spiez, Switzerland from 11-17 July 1999.

The one truism we have learned is that once an individual becomes a CW mustard casualty, the individual will always be a casualty. There are no cures, there might be relief and that is usually only temporary. Saddam’s oil monies, as a first priority, must be used for medical restitution for the 100,000+ Iranian and the 20,000+ Iraqi Kurdish CW victims. The second priority would be restitution to the 85% of the Iraqi population that are Shites and Kurds and who are not part of the 15% minority population that controls Iraq and all actions of the UN within Iraq.

The following are the keys to the abbreviations used in the below table:

Key for table
- = unknown / not known

Delivery: AC = aircraft, AR = Artillery, MS = mortar shell

CW gas types:
M = generic mustard, blistering;
N = nerve gas; B = blood gas
T = tear gas
D = damper gas
Na = nausea gas

98-6, issue no. 69