Supporting the troops

The Haliburton way....

A HALLIBURTON Co subsidiary provided water to US troops at a camp in Iraq that was twice as contaminated as water from the Euphrates River, former employees of the company said.

The subsidiary, Kellogg Brown and Root, also blocked employees' attempts to inform the US military at Camp Junction City in Ramadi that the water was foul or tell them that water tanks should immediately be chlorinated, the workers said.

They cited KBR's failure to test or treat the water in the latest in a series of hearings Senate Democrats have held on Halliburton, which was once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney and has huge contracts to provide services to the US military in Iraq.

Halliburton said in a statement it had found "no evidence to substantiate allegations made by these former employees".

While bottled water was provided for drinking and cooking, the soldiers at the camp used the contaminated water for bathing, shaving and laundry.

"We exposed a base camp population (military and civilian) to a water source that was not treated," said an internal e-mail from Will Granger, who was KBR's water quality manager for all of Iraq and Kuwait.

"The level of contamination was roughly 2x the normal contamination of untreated water from the Euphrates River," continued the e-mail dated July 15 of last year and released at the hearing. It said the exposure lasted for up to a year.

Coupled with the usual denials and lies.....

Rejecting the accusations, Halliburton said the military's own records showed the water was suitable for non-drinking uses, and that there was no documented case of unusual illnesses or health problems from the site.

Mr Carter and another former KBR employee, Ken May, said they have suffered from persistent gastrointestinal problems and that many other people at the camp complained of diarrhoea and other health problems.