#10
US documents allege up to 300 deaths in Soviet anthrax
outbreak
November 18, 2001
AFP
A 1979 outbreak of anthrax in the Soviet city of Sverdlovsk may have claimed between 200 and 300 lives and possibly forced a top local military commander to commit suicide, according to newly declassified US intelligence documents.
The papers, released by the National Security Archive, cast new light on a poignant but still murky drama in the city now known as Yekaterinburg, whose residents had not been told the truth until after the collapse of communism.
Former Russian presiden Boris Yeltsin publicly admitted in 1992 that the outbreak was caused by anthrax spores escaping a secret biological weapons research facility.
Earlier reports put the death toll in Sverdlovsk at 68.
But the documents, released Thursday, produced at the time by the US Central Intelligence Agency and the intelligence arm of the Pentagon, paint the picture of a major public health crisis complete with people attempting to flee, and the military taking over a hospital and killing stray animals.
US intelligence learned about the incident only six months after it occurred, with a top secret cable citing an unnamed Soviet emigre telling the CIA about a reported deadly accident at a biological warfare institute in Sverdlovsk.
"The specific nature of the accident is unknown, however, and the alleged number of deaths has varied from 40 to 300," said the cable, adding that there was a suspected biological weapons installation in Sverdlovsk.
By early 1980 had the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) collected enough information to draw a more or less complete account of the events and the presumed date of the tragedy: April 18, 1979.
According to a report produced by the DIA, the population of the city's Chkalovsky district was awaked by an explosion that many attributed to an aircraft breaking the sound barrier.
Four days later, between seven and eight people from the military facility known as Compound 19 were admitted to local hospital number 20 with high fever and severe respiratory problems.
They all died within six or seven hours, the DIA report said.
Six days later the death toll reached 40, prompting authorities to admit an outbreak of anthrax but to attribute it an anthrax-infected cow, which allegedly had been illegally slaughtered and sold on the market.
But those in the know were not about to accept the official line.
"People in the (research) institute who had been affected tried to flee in panic but were held inside by security personnel," the DIA reported.
"One of the source's friends also told him that personnel from several state agencies wanted to flee the city after learning of the accident but were restrained from doing so," the report pointed out.
Hospital number 20, where those infected were being brought, was taken over by the military, which imposed a total news blackout.
"The military takeover of the hospital resulted in concealment of the exact number of casualties, but there was talk of more than 200," the DIA said.
The agency also cited unconfirmed reports that the general in charge of Compound 19 "committed suicide after the first casualties."
For lack of crematoriums, dead bodies were first placed in chloramine, a disinfectant compound, and then secretly buried, with no relatives allowed to attend the funerals.
In a bid to stem the epidemic, a large swath of the city and nearby fields were sprayed with disinfectants, and wild animals and most city dogs were hunted down and killed to prevent further spreading of the germs, according to the documents.
The incident was used by Washington to accuse Moscow of violating the 1972 biological weapons convention, which banned biological warfare agents, a charge the Soviets consistently denied.
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