2016 CPEO Military List Archive

From: Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 2016 11:54:38 -0800 (PST)
Reply: cpeo-military
Subject: [CPEO-MEF] GLOBAL, FUEL: "The Collateral Environmental Damage of Airstrikes on ISIS Oil Facilities"
 
Fire and Oil: The Collateral Environmental Damage of Airstrikes on ISIS Oil Facilities


By Wim Zwijnenburg & Annica Waleij
New Security Beat
January 13, 2016 

As the United States, Russia, and others step up attacks on the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), there is concern over their direct and long-term environmental and public health impacts. Many air strikes have targeted lucrative oil installations under the control of ISIS, and these could have severe detrimental effects for Syria’s future, both environmentally and socio-economically. Questions around the effectiveness of these strikes, both from a military and political perspective, seem to be missing in the wider debate.

Although essentially forbidden by the Geneva Conventions, attacks on industrial infrastructure, including oil facilities, have been commonplace in armed conflict. Retreating Iraqi forces set close to 700 Kuwaiti oil wells on fire during the 1991 Gulf War. NATO forces targeted oil refineries and oil depots in Pančevo and the Novi Sad oil refineryin Serbia during the Balkans war in 1999. Israel struck storage tanks for a thermal power station in Lebanon in 2006, and Russian forces have bombed oil wells in Chechnya.

In many cases, military strikes caused air and soil contamination that added to existing legacies of pollution, making the post-conflict road to recovery and stability even longer. In the former Yugoslavia, the perception that allied forces cased additional harm contributed to the local population’s general mistrust towards the international community.

…

For the entire article, see
http://www.newsecuritybeat.org/2016/01/fire-oil-collateral-damage-airstrikes-isis-oil-facilities/

--

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org

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