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Agent Orange Still a Major Concern for Vietnam

Ha Nguyen

   HO CHI MINH CITY - Vietnam has handed over an area of land to its
   former war enemy the U.S., but this time the two sides aren't fighting
   across an old battlefield, but working together to fight what lies
   beneath.

   What lies beneath are the remnants of Agent Orange, the chemical that
   U.S. forces sprayed across this country to destroy tree cover in the
   Vietnam War. Now Vietnam is handing over 37 hectares of land outside Ho
   Chi Minh City to the U.S. temporarily to remove the chemical, which has
   been linked to cancer and other diseases, birth defects, and
   environmental destruction.

   Officials from both nations participated in an official handover
   ceremony Friday in Hanoi, before starting on the clean-up project in
   southern Bien Hoa city.

   "The Bien Hoa Airbase, the primary Agent Orange storage and handling
   site during the U.S.-Vietnam War, is the largest remaining hotspot of
   dioxin contamination in Vietnam," the U.S. embassy in Hanoi said in a
   statement. It said this marks the latest in a general effort "to
   cooperate on the humanitarian mission of accounting for personnel still
   missing from the war, and resolve wartime legacy issues including the
   removal of unexploded ordnance, support for persons with disabilities,
   and the remediation of dioxin."

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