Atomic test award may top $279M

Press, 5 July 1983, Page 15

Atomic test award may top $279M

NZPA Washington The United States has agreed to pay the 28,000 residents of the Marshall Islands at least SUSIB3.7M ($279.2M) to compensate them for damage caused by atomic testing. The agreement, signed in the Marshall Islands by a Presidential envoy, Fred Zeder, comes after 15 years of negotiations and must be approved by Congress and by a plebiscite in the Marshalls.

The islanders will also vote on "free association” status which would give them control over their internal affairs but leave the United States in charge of military security. The United States retains rights to use Kwajalein atoll as a missile range over the next 30 years. Similar "free association plebiscites have already been held in Palau and the Federation of Micronesian States, but have yet to gain Congressional approval. More than 200 Marshall Islanders on the atolls of Rongelap and Utirik were ecposed to radioactivity in 1V54 after the UnitexwStates tested a 15-megaton bomb,

and about 100 of them developed cancers and thyroid abnormalities.

The property of thousands of others on Bikini and Eniwetok atolls was destroyed or contaminated by radiation from tests. The United States tested 43 nuclear weapons on Eniwetok Atoll between 1947 and 1953, and Marshall islanders filed claims in the United States for compensation totalling more than SUS 4 billion (?6 billion), but these will be dropped if the agreement goes through. The agreement provides for the United States to set up a ?USISOM trust fund with the islanders guaranteed at least 5U5183.7M in income from it over the next 15 years. Another JUS47.SM will be available to cover personal injury claims.

At the end of 15 years, three-quarters of the income from the trust will be set aside to pay for any claims that may arise and the rest will be spent on social services.

The United States (_now has trusteeship over K the islands, granted by»? the United Nations in 1947.