POST PRODUCTION SCRIPT
FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT
2019
Secret Sardinia
29 mins 55 secs
©2019
ABC
Ultimo Centre
700
Harris Street Ultimo
NSW
2007 Australia
GPO
Box 9994
Sydney
NSW
2001 Australia
Phone:
:61 419 231 533
e-mail : miller.stuart@abc.net.au
Precis |
Sardinia is an island cut in two. Along the
white beach-studded Costa Smeralda, a magnet for the rich and famous, a villa
can fetch close to $150 million. |
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“That house is owned by the head of Volkswagen,” says realtor Lorenzo
Camillo as he takes reporter Emma Alberici for a sail on his yacht. “Ah there
we are - there’s the famous Berlusconi villa.” |
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But more than a third of Sardinia –
including much of its waters – is off limits to locals and visitors, whatever
their celebrity. This area is controlled by the Italian military, rented out
for some of the world’s biggest war games and home to Europe’s biggest bomb
test site. |
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This has many locals riled. “Islands, little
islands have disappeared, erased by missiles shot from the land, the sky and
the sea,” says former Sardinian president Mauro Pili. |
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Pili has also recorded the destruction of
some of Sardinia’s unique nuraghe - turret-like stone Bronze Age structures
built some 3500 years ago – by test bombs. |
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But it’s not cultural vandalism or
restricted movement that most concerns Sardinians. In areas near the test
sites, there have been high rates of cancers, birth defects and early death. |
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Giancarlo Piras recalls what the doctor said
when his son Francesco, who had served as a soldier at a bombing range, got
pancreatic cancer at age 27: “By any chance has your son been in contact with
radioactive material?” |
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Children were born with deformities
including missing limbs. In one village in one year, one in four new born
babies had some kind of defect. Sheep grazing on the test sites gave birth to
grotesquely twisted lambs. Their shepherds too had phenomenally high rates of
cancer. |
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Tissue samples from man and beast showed
high levels of a highly toxic material used in many bomb tests. “The longer
they lived in the area, the higher the quantity,” a nuclear physicist tells
Alberici. |
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As public pressure grew for a full
accounting, the military pushed back. “If they didn’t want us to see
something they wouldn’t show it to us. They feared we could find something
unusual,” says an MP who headed a parliamentary inquiry. |
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Generals went on the front foot, blaming
people’s illnesses on close inbreeding.
With much fanfare, they announced a scientific inquiry. But as Alberici reports, evidence shows
they nobbled it. |
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GFX: Foreign Correspondent |
Music |
00:00 |
Fade up from black |
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00:03 |
Drone shots of yacht. GFX: |
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00:08 |
GFX: Sardinia, Italy |
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00:12 |
Alberici on yacht. GFX: |
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00:16 |
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EMMA ALBERICI: [on a
sailing boat] “The Costa Smeralda is a magnet for the rich and famous. It hosts the most beautiful beaches in all
of Europe, |
00:20 |
Alberici to camera on yacht |
but I’ve come here to
investigate a darker side – the cover ups, the secrets, the mystery illnesses
that have blighted life on this glorious island for decades”. |
00:29 |
|
Music |
00:41 |
Alberici on yacht with
Lorenzo |
“That’s an amazing
place”. LORENZO CAMILLO:
“Yes, that’s built on the Punta Volpe it's called here. It belonged to the
President of Volkswagen, Hahn”. |
00:44 |
Views of luxury homes from
yacht |
EMMA ALBERICI: Sailing with Australian real estate broker
Lorenzo Camillo and his daughter Lisa, it’s not hard to see what draws people
to this place. Former Prime Minister
Silvio Berlusconi was one of the first to invest here. LORENZO CAMILLO:
“There we are, there’s the famous Berlusconi Villa. A very large house with an enormous
property”. |
00:53 |
Alberici on yacht with
Lorenzo looking at properties |
EMMA ALBERICI: “To
the extent that there is such a thing as a typical villa along the Costa
Smeralda, what would… what would it cost?” |
01:19 |
|
LORENZO CAMILLO:
“Well, entry level is probably around 20 million upwards”. EMMA ALBERICI:
“Twenty million euros!” LORENZO CAMILLO:
“Twenty million euros upwards, twenty, thirty, forty”. EMMA ALBERICI: “Now
there’s affordable property”. LORENZO CAMILLO: “Up
to over a hundred also there’s been a sale”. EMMA ALBERICI: “Wow!” LORENZO CAMILLO:
"Because they are very unique properties." |
01:26 |
Drone shots over beach |
EMMA ALBERICI: The wealth of the north is a stark contrast
to other parts of the island where visitors are forbidden. |
01:41 |
Military war games on beach |
Music |
01:48 |
GFX: Map. Italy/Sardinia |
EMMA ALBERICI: Sardinia plays host to some of the world’s
most elaborate war games, like this one in 2015. |
01:52 |
Archival. “Trident
Juncture” footage |
“Trident Juncture”
was one of NATO’s biggest exercises.
Dozens of countries were involved.
The military exclusion |
02:00 |
GFX: Map. Sardinia showing
military exclusion zones |
zones cover more than
a third of Sardinia’s land, sea and air.
Rome |
02:14 |
Military craft on beach |
is reported to be
making one and a half million dollars a day renting out this space to foreign
forces and weapons manufacturers. |
02:23 |
Drone shot. Beach. Yacht |
LISA CAMILLO: “When I
was younger, |
02:34 |
Lisa Camillo interview |
this for me of course
was always a paradise and I never noticed that actually, there were
submarines passing by”. EMMA ALBERICI: Lisa Camillo recently returned to |
02:37 |
Lisa and Alberici on yacht |
Sardinia after being
away almost two decades. She was
shocked by what she saw, so she made a film to raise awareness and is
campaigning to rid the island of its military bases. LISA CAMILLO: “I
never realised |
02:47 |
|
the extent or the
gravity of the situation and also we didn’t have internet back then so
everything was even more hidden”. |
03:04 |
Alberici driving to Teulada |
Music |
03:11 |
GFX: Map Sardinia/Teulada |
EMMA ALBERICI: Down south in Teulada, the beaches are just
as stunning, but they’re mostly inaccessible.
|
03:18 |
Drone shots over Teulada
beach |
This isn’t a
playground for the rich. |
03:26 |
Marica fishing boat |
The Marica family
have been fishing in these waters for generations. |
03:31 |
Marica family catching
octopus |
LUCIANO MARICA: “This
spot here is the forbidden zone where we’re not allowed to work. |
03:43 |
Alberici on boat with
Luciano |
It’s 200 metres from
Point Menga. Point Menga is the one
you can see looking out to Cape Teulada”. EMMA ALBERICI: “So
you’re saying 200 metres in that direction you can’t go. What happens if you do go there?” LUCIANO MARICA: “The
first time we go there it’s a 4000 euro fine”. |
03:47 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: “Four
thousand! Have you ever been fined?” LUCIANO
MARICA: “Ehh! Several times!” |
04:06 |
Drone shot. Marica fishing
boat |
Music |
04:11 |
Marica family boat |
EMMA ALBERICI: The
Italian Ministry of Defence has deemed vast areas of the sea around Sardinia
off limits. |
04:17 |
Luciano points out soldier
watching his boat |
LUCIANO MARICA:
“Sitting on the cement there…” EMMA ALBERICI: “He
said they’re sitting there watching he said”. LUCIANO MARICA:
“There they are. There’s a look-out
there. |
04:27 |
|
They put a soldier
there to watch to ensure we don’t cross the boundary”. EMMA ALBERICI: “Oh so
you can see them now?” LUCIANO MARICA: “Yes,
you can see them. |
04:34 |
|
They’ll call and…” EMMA ALBERICI: “There
are two members of the military up there watching us”. |
04:43 |
Military installation. |
Music |
04:47 |
Alberici driving past
installations |
EMMA ALBERICI: Most of the military operations on Sardinia
have been kept secret since 1951. They’re the result of an arrangement struck
with NATO countries after the Second World War. |
04:54 |
Mauro Pili watches video footage
with Alberici |
MAURO PILI: “… the
inspector in charge of radioactivity there and this is the commander of the
Teulada base”. EMMA ALBERICI: Mauro Pili has made it his life’s mission
to bust open this wall of silence. He
was once the political leader of Sardinia, |
05:07 |
|
but even then he
couldn’t get access to see what was going on at the military bases. |
05:24 |
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Mauro Pili did
eventually get into the Teulada military site, but only after he was elected
to the federal parliament in Rome. He
was told there would be strictly no filming allowed. MAURO PILI:
“Obviously these are pictures I filmed without authorisation. |
05:32 |
|
I absolutely had the
right to film, but they said I wasn’t allowed. So I smuggled my camera in as you can see”. |
05:51 |
Firing of MILAN missiles |
EMMA ALBERICI: Despite the secrecy, bits of information
have started to leak out. In 2017,
Sardinian health authorities confirmed 4,200 French-made MILAN missiles
arrived on the island over the twenty years to 2003. Some were fired at Teulada. |
05:58 |
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MAURO PILI: “This”,
he says, “this is the MILAN missile, |
06:32 |
Alberici and Mauro look at
footage |
the residue from the
thorium of the MILAN missile”. EMMA ALBERICI: “That
they had exploded?” |
06:35 |
|
MAURO PILI: “Yes, the
radioactive imager from the MILAN missile”. EMMA ALBERICI: The
guidance systems of these MILAN missiles each carry three grams of
radioactive thorium. Inhaling thorium
dust increases the risk of lung and pancreatic cancer. |
06:40 |
Archive. MILAN missile
firing |
MAURO PILI: “Islands
have vanished. Little islands in the
middle of the sea have been wiped out by missiles. Missiles shot from land, from the air and
from the sea itself. |
07:02 |
Mauro 100% |
The whole morphology
of the landscape has changed”. |
07:13 |
Funeral service in Teulada |
EMMA ALBERICI: The
main concern for Sardinians living close to the firing ranges, isn’t about
damage to the land or restricted access – they’re worried that bomb residue
might be killing them. Today, Teulada
is saying goodbye to another of its citizens, fifty-nine-year-old Mario
Troga. As a young man he worked at the
firing range. He died of lung cancer
but he wasn’t a smoker. Many of the
people gathered here have been touched by cancer. |
07:16 |
Funeral procession |
GUILIO ANGIONI: “My
mother-in-law died of cancer. They cut
my father-in-law’s leg off because it was cancerous. My father died. |
07:58 |
Guilio interview |
My sister died young
of lung cancer. My wife is still
alive, but she has several cancers.
She’s been operated on three times – twice for her breasts and once
for her lung. My wife now has half a
left lung. She’s still alive but she’s been through so much”. |
08:07 |
Alberici with Guilio and
friend |
EMMA ALBERICI: Guilio Angioni and his friends blame the
Italian defence force for their suffering. |
08:25 |
|
ERICINA LAI: “My
husband was 65. It was cancer. Within a month this devastating cancer took
him away”. |
08:31 |
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EMMA ALBERICI: “And
he worked nearby?” ERICINA LAI: “When my
husband was young he worked at the military base”. |
08:37 |
Plane flies
overhead at Abbondia’s |
|
08:41 |
Abbondia’s
animals and garden |
EMMA ALBERICI: The
Italian military has always denied doing anything to hurt the people, the
land, or the animals of Sardinia. |
08:45 |
Abbondia shows photos |
Abbondia Piras and
her husband Giancarlo have been fighting the military through the courts for
ten years. |
08:56 |
|
ABBONDIA PIRAS: “They
should have protected him, kept him safe.
|
09:06 |
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Here’s Francesco”. EMMA ALBERICI: “He
has a beautiful smile”. |
09:10 |
|
ABBONDIA PIRAS: “He
liked playing music. Here he is with a
little girlfriend – his first girlfriend”. |
09:19 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: Francesco Piras did his |
09:28 |
Abbondia makes coffee |
national service at
Teulada in the late nineties. He took
part in military exercises and his parents say |
09:31 |
Spent missile shells |
he was ordered to
pick up old shells with his bare hands.
A few years later, at the age of 27, he was diagnosed with pancreatic
cancer. |
09:38 |
Alberici with Abbondia and Giancarlo |
His parents blame the
armed forces. |
09:53 |
Framed photo of Francesco |
“Could it have been
something else?” |
09:56 |
Giancarlo interview |
GIANCARLO PIRAS: “No,
absolutely not. Because the final
remarks of his medial report said that it was impossible that someone living
a normal lifestyle in contact with ordinary things, it would be impossible
for that person to have all that rubbish in their liver”. |
09:59 |
GFX: Francesco's liver tissue |
EMMA ALBERICI: “This
is the rubbish Giancarlo says built up in his son’s liver. They’re particles so small they can quickly
pass through your lungs and into your body.
|
10:19 |
Gatti analysing tissue |
Biomedical engineer
Antonietta Gatti analysed Francesco’s liver tissue. She found nanoparticles of seven different
metals in the tumour, including chromium, tungsten and titanium. There’s no metals industry around but these
are all used by the arms industry. Dr Gatti believes Francesco was contaminated
by dust from a big explosion. |
10:33 |
Gatti interview |
DR ANTONIETTA GATTI:
“You find the pollution is closely related to what was combusted. That is the fundamental point”. |
11:10 |
Gatti analysing tissue |
EMMA ALBERICI: The
science of nanoparticles is still new, but the World Health Organisation says
early signs show that fine material may be harmful to public health. The WHO is encouraging further
research. In the meantime, it advises
those at risk of industrial exposure to nanoparticles to exercise caution. Dr
Gatti has consulted to four parliamentary inquiries that looked into the
activities of the Italian defence force. |
11:20 |
Gatti interview |
DR ANTONIETTA GATTI:
“We received three million euros (from the EU) in a partnership with 11 laboratories,
all highly qualified at the European level.
We verified that nanoparticles can penetrate cells”. |
11:55 |
Photos of Francesco |
ABBONDIA PIRAS: “It
was three months of intense pain. |
12:18 |
Abbondia interview |
Physical pain. Mental pain. Because of what he knew. So…
death awaits us. It can happen. But the pain that he had in those three
months who could have believed? You can’t imagine how much he suffered”. |
12:24 |
Driving to Escalaplano |
Music |
12:52 |
GFX: Map showing route Teulada to Quirra |
EMMA ALBERICI: It’s a
two hour drive heading north out of Teulada to the Quirra bombing range. |
12:55 |
Driving to Escalaplano |
This is the scene of
tragic health stories and mysterious birth defects that have come to be
dubbed “The Quirra syndrome”. |
13:02 |
Shepherd with flock |
For many here life is
still slow and traditional, |
13:18 |
Escalaplano township |
but at towns like Escalaplano,
perched on the edge of the firing range, passions are inflamed. MAURO PILI: “Some 186
deaths in Quirra the |
13:24 |
Mauro Pili interview |
ones that are known”. EMMA ALBERICI: “Not
only soldiers?” MAURO PILI: “Not only
soldiers, but the majority of them had worked inside Quirra”. |
13:35 |
Quirra military test site |
|
13:46 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: Quirra
is the biggest military test site in Europe. It’s used by NATO countries as
well as Israel. |
13:50 |
Houses adjoining test site |
Those living nearby
have known much tragedy. |
14:02 |
Alberici walks through t
own with Dr Gatti |
Dr Gatti has become
an advocate for some of the people of Quirra. |
14:09 |
|
Maria Theresa already
had ten healthy children when her last child arrived in 1988. The baby girl was born so severely
deformed, |
14:24 |
Maria Theresa stokes fire |
her mother has never let
her photo be seen. The townsfolk made cruel remarks. |
14:37 |
Alberici with Maria Theresa
and Dr Gatti |
MARIA THERESE FARCI:
“You could not erase what they said even if you could use ammonia or bleach”. |
14:45 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: She was baptised Maria Grazia. She was
blind and couldn’t move or speak. |
14:51 |
|
MARIA THERESE FACI:
“It was enough to gently stroke her face but without speaking… “Ahh…
Ahh”. It was such a… all those who
knew Maria Grazia have not forgotten her, because she really remains inside
you”. |
14:58 |
Escalaplano cemetery |
Music |
15:17 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: Escalaplano cemetery is a sad
testament. One in four of the children
born in the same year as Maria Grazia had some kind of deformity. |
15:24 |
|
MARIA THERESE FACI:
“Some people, they never… |
15:37 |
Alberici with Maria Theresa
and Dr Gatti |
They would never talk
about it. Many of them. Some even had
abortions”. |
15:41 |
Alberici in cemetery |
EMMA ALBERICI: Maria Grazia lived to 25 with tireless
daily care. |
15:49 |
Maria Theresa reads from
diary |
Her last moments
recorded in her mother’s diary. MARIA THERESE FACI:
“Around 10.30 a.m.… wait, my legs are shaking. It happens when I get very
agitated. |
16:00 |
|
Basically, she died
in my arms. She died in my arms. There was nothing we could do to prevent
it. My whole world collapsed. I knew
that Maria Grazia was sick, but I wasn’t ready. No, I wasn’t ready”. |
16:16 |
Alberici with Gianpiero
Scanu |
EMMA ALBERICI:
Gianpiero Scanu has tried to hold the military to account. He led a two-year
parliamentary inquiry. His committee
met fierce resistance from the chiefs of defence. |
16:42 |
Gianpiero interview |
GIANPIERO SCANU: “If
they didn’t want us to see certain things, they didn’t let us see them. They could do whatever they wanted at the
firing ranges because they weren’t monitored at all. You couldn’t even stick
your nose in to try to understand what was going on”. |
16:59 |
Alberici on street to
camera |
EMMA ALBERICI: “We’ve
made repeated attempts to speak to the military during our research for this
story but we’ve been blocked at every turn.
|
17:21 |
Alberici holds Ministry of Defence memo |
Now this document
dated 2011 has come our way. It’s a confidential Ministry of Defence memo
instructing military officials on how to respond to questions about the
health and environmental conditions in and around the bombing sites. What
stands out is what they’re told to say about birth defects. They’re told to explain it away with a
shocking allegation, that children born with deformities are the result of
inbreeding”. |
17:29 |
Molteni on Swiss TV news. |
GENERAL FABIO
MOLTENI: “No, they started doing genetic studies… But they don’t want to tell
you about that”. EMMA ALBERICI: This is General Fabio Molteni, a former
head of the Quirra base. He’s caught
on Swiss TV delivering that key message. GENERAL FABIO
MOLTENI: “They are all relatives, relatives.
They marry between cousins, brothers, one another. But you can’t say
it, or you’ll offend the Sardinians”. EMMA ALBERICI:
There’s no evidence to support that claim.
|
18:03 |
Military film. Ordnance
disposal |
The children born
with disabilities were conceived in the late '80s when old munitions, bombs
and rockets were being routinely disposed of at Quirra. They were blown up in a pit, twenty metres
deep and forty metres wide. |
18:30 |
Dr Gatti, Maria Theresa and
Alberici |
“Did you see it?” MARIA THERESA FACI:
“Yes and I was not the only one.
Everybody saw it”. EMMA ALBERICI: “What
was it like?” MARIA THERESA FACI:
“The dust was red. Not black. It was
red”. |
19:02 |
File footage. Rocket tests.
Explosions, smoke |
EMMA ALBERICI: For decades, dust from explosions and tests
has rained down on the towns and the grazing fields of the firing range. Exactly what was in them, no one knows. |
19:13 |
Dawn. Florence |
Music |
19:37 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: In the early 2000s, local doctors saw a
spike in the number of unusual cancers in their patients. At the same time, over in Florence, |
19:43 |
Domenico into house, sits
at computer |
military pilot
Domenico Leggiero was raising his concerns. He’d seen a high incidence of
cancers among fellow soldiers returning from Kosovo where they’d been exposed
to depleted uranium. |
19:56 |
|
DOMENICO LEGGIERO:
“Once we started discovering what was happening in areas of international
operations, it was natural to consider Sardinia as well. Because again, the amount of ammunition
exploded |
20:12 |
Domenico 100% |
and the amount of
training and military exercises that were carried out, and still are, in
Sardinian ranges are nothing less than the situation of an actual theatre of warfare”. |
20:24 |
File footage. Conducting
soil tests |
EMMA ALBERICI: The
Italian military felt the pressure.
Depleted uranium is mildly radioactive and long suspected of causing
cancer and birth defects. It’s used to
help missiles penetrate heavy armour. |
20:39 |
|
At Quirra, scientist
Francesco Riccobono was flown in by the Ministry of Defence to do some soil
tests in front of a swarm of local media. |
21:00 |
Ricci at press conference |
COLONEL PAOLO RICCI:
[address to media 2002] “It’s conventional weapons testing here. There is absolutely no testing of nuclear
weapons, and nothing peculiar, especially nothing containing depleted uranium
because we absolutely don’t use it”. |
21:12 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI:
Francesco Riccobono didn’t find any depleted uranium, keeping quiet about the
possible presence of thorium, defence declared the firing range clear. |
21:22 |
Domenico interview |
DOMENICO LEGGIERO:
“The Italians do not have equipment to make uranium weapons. They have never shot such weapons. True.
But the firing ranges of Sardinia are international firing ranges. When a NATO country asks to use a range it
is also bound not to disclose what is used there. It’s an issue of confidentiality and
national security”. |
21:35 |
Video footage of deformed
lambs |
FARMER: “How terrible, how terrible!” EMMA ALBERICI: Then
in 2010, events took a shocking turn.
The photos you’re about to see are disturbing. |
21:56 |
Photos. Deformed lambs |
A lamb born with one
eye. Others with deformities the likes
and severity of which scientists and public health experts had never seen
before. |
22:10 |
Mellis interview |
GIORGIO MELLIS:
“Lambs were born with eyes in the back of their heads. The eyes were at the back inside the
ears. I had never seen anything like
it. A farmer told me when I said to
him “What’s going on?” He said, “I was too scared to enter the barn in the mornings,
I didn’t want to see those deformed little goats. They were monstrosities you didn’t want to
see”. |
22:28 |
Goats on hillside |
EMMA ALBERICI: Vet
Giorgio Mellis co-wrote a report for the district health authority, assessing
the risks posed by activities at the bombing range. Remarkably, the team of scientists found
65% of the shepherds living close to the range had cancers. GIORGIO MELLIS: “It
was the only place in the world |
23:03 |
Mellis interview |
where farmers lived
inside a bombing range and animals grazed in the zone where they carried out
these explosions, these bombings, all the exercises. We were very concerned for the people who
were there who ate this food. So we
informed all the authorities so that an in-depth investigation would take
place”. |
23:28 |
Exhumation at Escalaplano
cemetery |
EMMA ALBERICI: Immediately, a formal police investigation
was launched. The court ordered the
exhumation of 18 shepherds who’d died in the 20 years up to 2010. Their bones were shipped here to Italy’s north
and examined at two universities.
Nuclear Physicist, Evandro Lodi Rizzini, led some of that research. |
24:05 |
Alberici and Rizzini with
university chemical analyses |
EVANDRO LODI RIZZINI:
“The results from multiple analyses conducted at Brescia and Pavia showed the
presence in around 10 case, actually 11, |
24:36 |
Rizzini interview |
of elevated
quantities of uranium but most of all thorium”. |
24:52 |
Exhumation at Escalaplano
cemetery |
EMMA ALBERICI: Those 11 shepherds with high levels of
thorium in their bones had all lived close to the firing range. |
25:03 |
|
EVANDRO LODI RIZZINI:
“The longer someone lived in that area the higher the quantities of thorium
detected. |
25:13 |
GVs Lanusei |
Music |
25:21 |
|
EMMA ALBERICI: In the regional capital, Lanusei, the Chief
Prosecutor called a meeting with the scientist |
25:32 |
Re-enactment. Questioning
of Riccobono |
who’d done the soil
testing for the military. Why hadn’t research
Francesco Riccobono found any uranium or the much more dangerous thorium in
the soil at Quirra? While he was
questioned upstairs, outside police opened his car and hid a listening device
inside. As he drove back to the
airport, the bug picked up his conversation with an assistant. He’d been interrogated for leaving thorium
out of his report and he was angry with the military. |
25:37 |
Re-enactment. Secret
recording |
SECRET POLICE
RECORDING: “You’re the ones who fucking commissioned us to do this work. If you thought that was important if you’re
honest, you say to me hey, make sure to include it because it’s important”. |
26:20 |
Reprise of Ricci at press
conference. Riccobono watching |
EMMA ALBERICI: Francesco Riccobono’s university received a
$2.4 million dollar government grant to carry out its work. He was later acquitted of charges that he
was involved in a cover up. Mauro Pili
is still convinced of foul play. MAURO PILI: “It was
all part of this great government farce. |
26:31 |
Pili interview |
The idea was to gag
anyone who began to name the dangers present at that place in the
environment”. |
26:54 |
Court room footage |
EMMA ALBERICI: Eight
former commanders at Quirra are now on trial, charged with breaching their
duty of care for the health and safety of soldiers and civilians. |
27:06 |
Reprise of Molteni Swiss.
TV footage |
One of them is Fabio
Molteni, infamously caught on film claiming Sardinians are inbred. |
27:21 |
Reprise. Ricci press
conference |
Another is Paolo
Ricci who had declared Quirra uranium free. |
27:30 |
Scanu delivers finding |
After two decades and
three previous inconclusive inquiries, last year Gianpiero Scanu’s committee
made a bold finding. GIANPIERO SCANU: “The
causal link between the exposure to depleted uranium and diseases suffered by
the military has been confirmed at a judicial level. This is a milestone”. |
27:36 |
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EMMA ALBERICI: For
the first time, nanoparticles of depleted uranium were found to play a role
in the possible development of tumours. |
28:05 |
Montage. Missiles |
Crucially, thorium
when inhaled or ingested, was found to be five times more dangerous than
depleted uranium. The Scanu Report was
dismissed by the Italian defence force. |
28:17 |
Scanu interview |
GIANPIERO SCANU: “I
do believe that in the final report of the commission I chaired the truth was
finally disclosed”. |
28:33 |
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EMMA ALBERICI: But
after all that work by the commission, a new law to monitor the health of
soldiers was blocked by the upper house in Rome. |
28:46
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Sunset GVs |
For decades, Sardinia
has held its secrets close. It’s been
locked in an uncomfortable embrace with the world’s military. In a country
mired in debt, defence contracts are a source of income, but also quite
possibly the cause of untold misery. After all the inquiries, and with
military brass now on trial, for the people of this island paradise, there is
a glimmer of hope, that the truth may finally see the light of day. |
28:56 |
Credits: |
Reporter Producer Camera Editor |
29:39 |
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Edit assistant Research |
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Graphics |
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Executive Producer |
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abc.net.au/foreign |
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Out point |
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29:55 |