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Britain admit using servicemen in N-tests
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THE British Government admitted on Friday that it had used Commonwealth servicemen in nuclear radiation tests, but denied it had treated soldiers as guinea pigs or that it had lied about the experiments.
The ministry of defence told AFP that 12 service personnel from Britain, Australia and New Zealand were asked to perform manoeuvres like running and crawling through a contaminated area to test protective military clothing.
They were part of an "Indoctrinate Force" in Australia of about 80 servicemen in the 1950s and 1960s whose role was to test equipment which had been subjected to nuclear radiation, said a ministry spokeswoman.
The revelation followed claims by a Scottish researcher on Friday that she had uncovered new evidence of the experiments after nuclear weapons tests at Monte Bello Island, off Western Australia, and at Maralinga in South Australia.
Dundee University research fellow Professor Sue Rabbitt Roff told ABC radio in Australia: "The British government lied in court on the issue of whether or not British and Australian service personnel had been used deliberately for human experiments during nuclear weapons tests."
The British government claimed in the European Court of Human Rights in 1997 that no humans had ever been used in experiments in nuclear weapons trials.
The British defense ministry spokeswoman said: "These were not nuclear tests as such, these were radiation tests on clothing. We were not testing people, we were testing the clothing. People have never been used as guinea pigs.
"Twelve 'indoctrinees' were asked to do tests to see how military clothing worked," she said, adding it was a small trial and the soldiers received little radiation exposure.(SD-Agencies)
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