The maker of a controversial depleted uranium weapon used by the US Army has said that it is ceasing production.
Depleted uranium (DU) is an extremely strong and dense metal that is able to pierce armoured vehicles, making it the prime choice as the chief anti-tank ammunition used by the M1 Abrams, the US Army鈥檚 main battle tank. However, it is toxic and radioactive, and campaigners linking DU to cancer and other health issues have long called for it to be phased out.
That may now happen. During a quarterly earnings call on 27 January, Kathy Warden, the CEO of defence company Northrop Grumman, unexpectedly announced that it will stop producing the M829A4 DU round within a year.
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鈥淲e are looking to the future and the decision to cease production boils down to sustainability,鈥� Jarrod Krull of Northrop Grumman told New 杏吧原创. He declined to explain further, but said the decision wasn鈥檛 made for financial reasons.
The DU component used in the anti-tank round is produced for Northrop Grumman by another firm, Aerojet Rocketdyne, and it is unclear if it will continue to do so 鈥� the US . A spokesperson for Aerojet Rocketdyne declined to confirm either way, saying: 鈥淲e support the US military with cutting-edge, armour-piercing technology that protects our forces.鈥�
Only the UK and US have acknowledged using DU rounds in action, but other nations, such as Russia, have them. Some have long renounced them 鈥� .
The shift away from DU appears to be the result of a gradual change in the political climate. 鈥淕enerally, the battle to stigmatise depleted uranium has been won,鈥� says Doug Weir at the Conflict and Environment Observatory, a UK non-profit organisation.
Weir also notes a diplomatic row, , over US tanks using depleted uranium rounds on firing ranges in Kuwait in 2009. The site required a clean-up after radiation levels were found to be 鈥渟ignificantly higher鈥� than acceptable.
The , but Weir says the weapons now appear to be in a category with cluster bombs and land mines as being unacceptable for some investors.
鈥淲eapons are banned or fall out of favour when they are stigmatised,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ecause of its nature, depleted uranium was always self-stigmatising to some extent, but national bans and UN resolutions have helped underline its unacceptability and Western militaries are moving away from it.鈥�
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