时间:2019-01-13 作者:英语课 分类:2007年VOA标准英语(六月)


英语课
By Matt Steinglass
Hanoi
26 June 2007

When Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet met United States President George Bush in Washington last week, they announced new efforts to tackle the damage caused by Agent Orange. Although the countries agreed victims of Agent Orange need help, scientists are still arguing over how harmful the chemical defoliant really was. Matt Steinglass has more from Hanoi.






A group of boys play together at a center for Agent Orange victims in Danang, Vietnam (File)


A group of boys play together at a center for Agent Orange victims in Danang, Vietnam (File)



Vietnam claims about three million of its citizens suffer health problems stemming from Agent Orange, which U.S. forces sprayed on Vietnamese jungles during the Vietnam War. The defoliant contained high levels of the toxic 1 chemical dioxin.


For many years, the United States rejected Vietnamese appeals for compensation for these victims, saying claims that diseases were caused by Agent Orange were not supported scientifically.


But recently, the U.S. has increased funding for medical aid to people with disabilities in Vietnam, and the U.S. Congress has appropriated $3 million for cleanup and treatment of dioxin-related illnesses.


Tom Leckinger, Hanoi representative of the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, is pleased.


"I've been involved with Agent Orange literally 2 since like the late '70s [1970s]," he said. "It has moved more in the past two years than it had in the entire the decades prior to that."


At a recent workshop in Hanoi, the U.S. Department of Defense 3 presented Vietnam's Defense Ministry 4 with an exhaustive two-year study showing how much Agent Orange had been stored and sprayed, and where.


Nathan Sage 5, environment officer at the U.S. Agency for International Development in Hanoi, says such cooperation is part of the countries' increasingly friendly relationship.


"The level of cooperation on this issue has never been better," said Sage. "And we will continue to support them because they asked for the assistance."


Leckinger says attitudes began to shift in late 2005, when a study by a chemical analysis firm, Hatfield Consultants 6, showed high levels of dioxin contamination on former U.S. bases where Agent Orange was stored, but no contamination in the countryside.


"I believe that freed up the Vietnamese government to finally come forward and say, 'Now we have to address this,' without being concerned about export issues, agricultural and seafood 7 exports," he said.


It also reassured 8 the U.S. that assistance could focus on cleaning up dioxin "hot spots" near former U.S. bases.


Although the governments are cooperating, the scientists still often disagree on how much Agent Orange-related dioxin is in Vietnam, and what the health effects are.


U.S. scientist Alvin Young has been studying Agent Orange since the early 1970s. He says the Hatfield data on dioxin in the central Vietnamese city of Danang, is misleading.


He says much of the dioxin, or "TCDD", that Hatfield found might have come from other sources. Young points to Hatfield's discovery of dioxin in the Vietnamese city of Can Tho, which he says probably came from the open-air burning of trash at a municipal dump.


"My conclusion: it is highly unlikely that Hatfield Consultants detected TCDD from Agent Orange," Young said.


Dr. Le Ke Son, head of the Vietnamese Red Cross's Agent Orange victims program, disagrees. He says he has found clusters of birth defects near Agent Orange storage sites.


Son notes that the U.S. government has recently set aside money to help Agent Orange victims. He says Vietnam appreciates this as a sign that the U.S. sees the problem from a new angle.


For three years, a group of Vietnamese Agent Orange victims has been suing the U.S. manufacturers of the defoliant. The suit was dismissed in 2005, but the Vietnamese appealed and argued their case in New York last week.


Leckinger of the Vietnam Veterans Group says that, even if the suit is reinstated, compensation is a long way off.


"I would bet a month's salary we're looking at 10 years before this thing would come even close to a trial," he said. "So to be implying that there's some level of compensation in any near future time-frame is simply raising people's hopes falsely."


Even if some American scientists still do not accept how serious the damage from Agent Orange was, the U.S. and Vietnamese governments are cooperating to help some of those who Vietnam says are victims. For those long involved in the issue, that counts as progress.




adj.有毒的,因中毒引起的
  • The factory had accidentally released a quantity of toxic waste into the sea.这家工厂意外泄漏大量有毒废物到海中。
  • There is a risk that toxic chemicals might be blasted into the atmosphere.爆炸后有毒化学物质可能会进入大气层。
adv.照字面意义,逐字地;确实
  • He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
  • Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候,她不走到真正要昏厥了,决不肯坐下来。
n.防御,保卫;[pl.]防务工事;辩护,答辩
  • The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
  • The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。
n.(政府的)部;牧师
  • They sent a deputation to the ministry to complain.他们派了一个代表团到部里投诉。
  • We probed the Air Ministry statements.我们调查了空军部的记录。
n.圣人,哲人;adj.贤明的,明智的
  • I was grateful for the old man's sage advice.我很感激那位老人贤明的忠告。
  • The sage is the instructor of a hundred ages.这位哲人是百代之师。
顾问( consultant的名词复数 ); 高级顾问医生,会诊医生
  • a firm of management consultants 管理咨询公司
  • There're many consultants in hospital. 医院里有很多会诊医生。
n.海产食品,海味,海鲜
  • There's an excellent seafood restaurant near here.离这儿不远有家非常不错的海鲜馆。
  • Shrimps are a popular type of seafood.小虾是比较普遍的一种海味。
adj.使消除疑虑的;使放心的v.再保证,恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词)
  • The captain's confidence during the storm reassured the passengers. 在风暴中船长的信念使旅客们恢复了信心。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
  • The doctor reassured the old lady. 医生叫那位老妇人放心。 来自《简明英汉词典》
学英语单词
1394 ieee standard
ANTI-S
antidrom-
approximate length
aquaeductus mesencephali
Armco stabilized steel
atrek
atrioventricular aperture
be one's own be nobody's enemy but one's own
bender tents
binary separation
blue hill b.
boyle-charlie's law
broadwise number
butenic acid
capryl alcohol
cash-limited subhead
CD4 T cell
ceenis
cetonias
chemical-compound
colasposoma auripenne
collimation system
corlde
corvo
cryopathy
design guidelines
detachable device
digital radiography
dition
english education
Eria formosana
Etopiam
fast cooking
fatigue testing at low temperature
felis bengalensis chinensis
fire resistive
forspent
g-series war gases
Gentiana elwesii
geologic orbital photography
idler register
Ima-gawa
immuner
in-line interrupt service routine
kip-up
labracinus melanotaenia
lap-welded tubing
leaf cycle
LED flashlight
Lindera megaphylla
live chat
long - term plan
long pants
lost his tongue
Lully, Jean Baptiste
lunked
macrosporocarp
mapsheet
melaniferous phagocyte
more talented
neonatal ring
noiseuse
oraltoxicity
oscillating scan
over and above the assigned profit norm
passion plays
pasteure crop
peucin
phacofragmentor
Plöckenpass(Monte Croce Carnico, P.di)
Podlaskie
preeditor
primordial lepidomorium
Principal Guaranteed Fund
proliv
Pueraria thunbergiana
quad latch
quarterly plan
reasoning by elimination
reciprocating positive displacement vacuum pump
recoll
reduced image
rhythmic gesture
scrubbing unit
seaisland (cotton)
septangle
specious argument
Sto.
submarine rescue vessel
terrigenous deposit
time schedule float
tough pitch copper
Traveling without Ticket
type of kerogen and its characteristic
unbrash
UNPOC
upfinder
vapor recovery
washing analysis
with view to
Yagoua