Okinawa's Agent Orange fears return with discovery of buried US barrels

Persistent suspicions that the United States stored the defoliant Agent Orange at its bases on Okinawa are back in the spotlight after the recent discovery of ageing chemical barrels buried on former US Air Force land.

Although the US military has consistently denied ever using Okinawa to store or transport the chemical - which has been linked to illnesses and birth defects - officials and environmental groups on Okinawa have expressed their anger over the find and are demanding information.

On June 13, 15 barrels were uncovered during work to lay a soccer field in Okinawa City. One bore the name of US firm Dow Chemical and, most worryingly, environmentalists say, the barrels were all empty.

Dow was one of the manufacturers of Agent Orange during the Vietnam war, when it was widely used to clear jungles and expose Vietcong fighters.

"They had been buried about one metre below the surface and were empty because the contents had leaked out into the surrounding area," said Masami Kawamura, director of environmental policy at the Citizens' Network for Biodiversity on Okinawa.

"This has caused a lot of concern among the people of Okinawa and we are calling on the city, the prefecture, the Okinawa Defence Bureau and the national government to carry out a thorough investigation - with transparency and accountability - into how these barrels were buried and what they originally contained," she said. "But already the Japanese and US governments are trying to cover this up."

Adding to Okinawans' concerns is a report by the Okinawa Defence Bureau that has identified high levels of aircraft fuel and petrol on land that was previously part of the US military's Camp Kuwae, also called Camp Lester.