9 avril, 2005 21:16
Vietnamese appeal U.S. court's ruling on Agent Orange case
April 9, 2005, 1:20 AM EDT
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) _ Attorneys for the Vietnamese plaintiffs whose lawsuit against U.S. chemical manufacturers of Agent Orange was dismissed last month have appealed the ruling, an official said Saturday.
The appeals were filed in Brooklyn, New York, on Thursday, said Tran Xuan Thu, General Secretary of the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange.
"We appealed because the ruling by the U.S. federal judge was irrational," he said.
The class action lawsuit filed on behalf of some 4 million Vietnamese claimed that U.S. chemical companies committed war crimes by manufacturing Agent Orange for military use during the Vietnam War.
On March 10, U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein threw out the case, saying that the allegedly toxic defoliant and similar U.S. herbicides used during the Vietnam War could not be considered poisons banned under international rules of war, even though they may have had comparable effects on people and land.
The Brooklyn judge also found that the plaintiffs could not prove that Agent Orange had caused their illnesses, largely because of a lack of large-scale research.
The lawsuit was the first attempt by Vietnamese plaintiffs to seek compensation for the effects of Agent Orange, which is laden with the highly toxic chemical dioxin and has been linked to cancer, diabetes and birth defects among Vietnamese soldiers, civilians and American veterans.
U.S. aircraft sprayed more than 21 million gallons of the chemical between 1962 to 1971 in attempts to destroy crops and remove foliage used as cover by communist forces.
Lawyers for Monsanto, Dow Chemical and more than a dozen other companies had said they should not be punished for following what they believed to be the legal orders of the nation's commander in chief.
They also argued that international law generally exempts corporations, as opposed to individuals, from liability for alleged war crimes.
Thu said the lawyers are compiling data on another 300 victims of Agent Orange that would be added to the appeal.
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.
