Justice for all Agent Orange's Victims

1. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070618/us_nm/vietnam_agentorange_damages_dc_1
By Christine Kearney 2 hours, 39 minutes ago
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Several major U.S. chemical companies are directly accountable for supplying the U.S. military with dioxin, or "agent orange," during the Vietnam War and causing widespread dioxin poisoning, a lawyer for Vietnamese plaintiffs told a federal appeals court on Monday.
The plaintiffs appealed a lower court decision that dismissed a civil suit seeking class-action status on behalf of more than 3 million Vietnamese people against the chemical companies. It could have resulted in billions of dollars in damages and the environmental cleanup of Vietnam.More than 30 companies, including Dow Chemical Co. and Monsanto Co., are named in the lawsuit.
U.S. warplanes dumped about 18 million gallons (70 million liters) of the defoliant on Vietnamese forests between 1962 and 1971 to destroy Vietnamese sources of food and cover. The plaintiffs seek damages from dioxin poisoning which decades later they say has caused cancer, deformities and organ dysfunction.
Jonathan Moore, the lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the chemical companies knew that the "agent orange" herbicide containing dioxin was harmful but did nothing.
"They knew how it was going to be used and they had reason to believe the effect would be disastrous and they did it anyway," Moore told the panel of three judges for the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals. "We are now seeing years later the fruit of that terrible poisonous product."
BATTLEFIELD IMPLICATIONS
The judges appeared unmoved by previous cases from years following World War Two, when makers of the gas Zyklon B, used in Nazi death camps, were convicted of crimes.
Unlike those cases, the judges questioned if poisons used in war that were not directly intended to kill people and only found years later to cause harm violated international law.
"It's a different circumstance here, is it not?" asked appeals court judge Robert Sack. "Is poison designed to kill or hurt?"
The case also considers the power of the U.S. president to authorize the use of hazardous materials during war, but the U.S. government was not sued due to sovereign immunity.
Former U.S. Solicitor General Seth Waxman, arguing for the chemical companies, noted a lack of legal precedent for punishing the use of poisons in war and warned of harming U.S. battlefield decisions if judges find the suit can proceed.
"This does affect our ongoing diplomacy," he said, citing the use of depleted uranium shells by U.S. forces in Iraq. Before the hearing, the Vietnamese plaintiffs and supporters held a rally. Among them was Nguyen Van Quy, a former member of the North Vietnamese army exposed to "agent orange" who is at the end stage of multiple cancers and has two children with birth defects.
"We need to tell the American citizens of the bad impact and consequences of 'agent orange' to many generations in Vietnam," said Quy, who traveled to New York from Haiphong, Vietnam.The judges were not expected to make a decision for several months, and if they found the suit could move ahead, it could take years before a trial is held and any damages are awarded.
In 1984, seven chemical companies including Dow and Monsanto agreed to settle out of court for $180 million with U.S. veterans who claimed "agent orange" caused cancer and other health problems.
The United States maintains there is no scientifically proven link between the wartime spraying and the more than 3 million people Vietnam says are disabled by dioxin over three generations.
2. http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070618/ny_agent_orange.html?.v=1

Agent Orange Appeal Is Heard in New York

Monday June 18, 6:23 pm ET By Larry Neumeister, Associated Press Writer Vietnamese Victims of Agent Orange Seek New York Court Help NEW YORK (AP) -- Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange received little encouragement from a federal appeals panel when they sought Monday to reinstate their claim that U.S. companies committed war crimes by making the toxic chemical defoliant available for use in the Vietnam War. The three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seemed more receptive to arguments by lawyers for the companies and the U.S. government that there was no evil intent when Agent Orange was used to clear the Vietnamese landscape of unfriendly crops for troops.Agent Orange has been linked to cancer, diabetes and birth defects among Vietnamese soldiers and civilians and American veterans.
Supporters of the 4 million Vietnamese described as plaintiffs in the lawsuit by U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein in Brooklyn packed a large Manhattan courtroom for several hours of arguments on the subject.
The appeals judges sounded reluctant to overturn Weinstein, who said in March 2005 that Agent Orange and similar U.S. herbicides cannot be considered poisons banned under international rules of war and that the lack of large-scale research made it impossible to show what caused illnesses.
Judge Robert Sack said he did not doubt that the plaintiffs, who are seeking millions of dollars, would "have an extremely strong case" if they could prove that companies knew Agent Orange contained a dangerous toxic substance and used it because they wanted to poison the people of Vietnam.
Plaintiffs lawyer Jonathan C. Moore said the companies were reckless because they deliberately took steps to make sure the highly toxic chemical dioxin was not kept out of Agent Orange."I do believe the conduct of the defendants was intentional. They knew the risk and went ahead anyway," Moore said. "The effect it had on the people of Vietnam was certainly significant and drastic."
Judge Roger J. Miner said he heard indications that neither the government nor manufacturers were aware of the toxicity of Agent Orange.
Judge Peter Hall noted that U.S. troops were directly exposed to Agent Orange and U.S. aircraft sprayed more than 21 million gallons of it between 1962 and 1971 in attempts to destroy crops and remove foliage used as cover by communist forces.
Moore said the defendants did not put dioxin in Agent Orange deliberately but failed to take it out because it would have slowed manufacturing and raised expenses at a time when the U.S. government was boosting the size of its orders.
"They made a conscious choice to keep the poison in the product," he said. "Having made that choice, they should now have to accept responsibility."
Hall upset Moore when he questioned what happens when a substance is used in wartime that "happens to have a little poison in it, the effects of which wasn't known at the time."
"Not a little poison," Moore shot back. "It's not a little poison. It's not trace amounts."
He said it was a battlefield decision with a "terrible result."
An attorney arguing on behalf of Monsanto, Dow Chemical and more than a dozen other companies said they were following the instructions of U.S. presidents and Congress during wartime.
"Even an international tribunal would not entertain these claims," said the attorney, Seth P. Waxman.
He noted that the U.S. government had filed papers in the case saying that the use of Agent Orange was a battlefield decision and any attempt to bring relief to the Vietnamese people should come as a result of diplomacy.
He told the court the matter was supposed to be discussed Monday when Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet visited the United States. On a visit to Vietnam last fall, President Bush and Triet agreed to discuss dioxin contamination at old Agent Orange storage sites.
Some 10,000 U.S. war veterans receive medical disability benefits related to Agent Orange. The Vietnamese government has said the United States has a moral responsibility for damage to its citizens and environment but has never sought compensation for victims. The appeals judges didn't indicate when they would rule.