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An Alzheimer's pill that helps slow the brain damage caused by the disease may also protect against the effects of nerve gases and pesticides, US researchers reported today. They said the drug, marketed under the name Reminyl and Razadyne, completely protected guinea pigs against the nerve agents soman and sarin, as well as toxic amounts of pesticides. They gave the animals high doses of the poisons and treated them with Reminyl, known generically as galantamine, along with atropine, often given as an antidote for organophosphate pesticides such as paraoxon. "To our amazement, the animals treated with galantamine behaved as if...

US intelligence analysts misunderstood intercepted Iraqi communications, believing the orders were meant to deceive UN weapons inspectors searching for chemical or biological agents, a new report says. Instead, the conversation between two Iraqi Republican Guard Corps commanders that included the order to remove reference to "nerve agents" from "wireless" communications was intended to ensure the regime was in compliance with international demands to disarm, the Foreign Affairs magazine reported in its online edition this week. That conversation was intercepted by the United States in 2002. The article was based on a recently declassified US Joint Forces Command report assessing Iraqi...

2 positive "hits" for a "nerve agent".......Breaking on CNN

<p>NEWPORT, Ind. -- About 30 gallons of a liquid containing a deadly Cold War-era nerve agent spilled at an Indiana chemical weapons depot, but it was safely contained in a sealed area and no one was injured, the Army said Saturday.</p>

Final preparations are under way at the Newport Chemical Disposal Facility, where workers are just days away from starting the destruction of VX nerve agent. Col. Jesse Barber, Chemical Materials Agency's project manager of Alternative and Approaches, goes over his checklist every day in anticipation of startup, he said. The 1,269 tons of the deadly nerve agent VX has been stored at the Newport Chemical Depot since the 1960s. A drop of VX the size of a BB can be lethal, the Army has said. Destruction of this nerve-agent stockpile will remove the risk of a terrorist target and the...

Journalists want to talk about “news,” not “olds.” If a story broke two days ago, it’s not likely to get coverage today unless there’s a new angle to discuss. And that’s a shame sometimes, because when a story has been insufficiently covered, you wish they’d revisit it. For example, on May 15, insurgents attacked an American military convoy. No, that’s not really news. But the fact that they used a shell containing the nerve gas sarin should have been. Sarin is so powerful that just a tiny amount can kill instantly. But this discovery didn’t fit the media template that...

9:47am (UK) Sarin Shell 'Probably A Stray' - Blix Former chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said today that a shell containing sarin nerve gas used in an attack in Iraq was probably a stray weapon that could have been dated from the first Gulf War. Blix said the discovery of the nerve agent was not a sign that Saddam Hussein's regime possessed weapons of mass destruction before the war last year. The US-led coalition used that claim to justify the invasion even though UN inspectors failed to make any significant finds before the war. The former Swedish foreign minister...

Breaking news ... nothing follows

FORMER chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said that a shell containing sarin nerve gas used in an attack in Iraq was most likely a stray weapon possibly from the first Gulf War. Blix said today that the discovery of the nerve agent was not a sign that Saddam Hussein's regime possessed weapons of mass destruction before the war last year. The US-led coalition used that claim to justify the invasion even though UN inspectors failed to make any significant finds before the war. The former Swedish foreign minister said the 155-mm shell used to attack a US military...

<p>The Army said it will delay destruction of a deadly nerve agent at the Newport Chemical Depot until early 2004 because the plant doesn't yet meet environmental standards or have a sprinkler system.</p> <p>A federal lawsuit in Ohio, announced last month, also might add to the delay of a process ordered by international treaty and shadowed by terrorism.</p>

Army to Destroy Nerve Agent at Ala. Depot By KYLE WINGFIELD Associated Press Writer MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) -- The Army has announced that next week it will begin destroying more than 2,200 tons of nerve agent at an Alabama depot - an operation that nearby residents and environmental groups have criticized as too risky. The announcement Thursday by acting Army Secretary Les Brownlee came a day after state environmental officials issued a permit allowing the Army to start up its $1 billion incinerator at the Anniston Army Depot. Brownlee gave the order to begin destroying deadly nerve agent and...

<p>Firefighters, police and BART workers prepared Sunday for what was once considered the unthinkable -- a biological or chemical attack on a packed train during the evening commute.</p> <p>In a predawn drill at the North Berkeley BART station, dozens of people pretended it was 4 p.m. on a Tuesday and that someone had just lobbed a canister containing sarin gas -- a deadly nerve agent -- into a 10-car Richmond-bound train containing about 700 passengers. Sarin, used in the 1995 attack on the Tokyo subway that killed 12 people in 1995, causes convulsions, paralysis and asphyxiation.</p>