ABC News on Thursday showed video that appeared to confirm that explosives that went missing in Iraq did not disappear until after the United States had taken control of the facility where they were stored. The disappearance of the hundreds of tons of explosives from the Al Qaqaa storage facility has become a hotly contested issue in the U.S. presidential campaign. Democrat John Kerry said it was an example of President Bush bungling the Iraq war. Bush countered that Kerry was making wild accusations without knowing the facts.
Vice President Dick Cheney said it was possible that the explosives had been removed from the site before the U.S. forces arrived there. ABC said the video was shot by an affiliate TV station embedded with the 101st Airborne Division when members of the division passed through the facility on April 18, nine days after the fall of Baghdad. ABC said experts who have studied the images say the barrels seen in the video contain the high explosive HMX, and U.N. markings on the sealed containers were clear. The barrels were found inside locked bunkers that had been sealed by inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency just before the war began, ABC reported. |