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Friendly Fire video

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A series of portraits of Italian army personnel, or their families, affected by the Balkan syndrome, represented by different forms of cancers, all linked to the contamination due to depleted uranium nanoparticles.

Friendly Fire video

To date, more than 200 soldiers of the Italian army have died because of the Balkan syndrome, and about 2500 are sick. These numbers reflect the impact that the use of depleted uranium weapons on people's health. However, the utilization of DU ammunitions has been historically controversial. In 2005, Italian Defense minister Antonio Martino asserted that “our soldiers don't have any risk with depleted uranium: they don't use it, and neither do the soldiers of other countries”. In 2009, a manual for the German Army in Afghanistan proved that depleted uranium weapons had been used by the US army in all the most recent conflicts although military personnel always provided reassurance that no such weapons were employed.