Global Security Newswire

A U.S. laboratory confirmed that a roadside bomb found earlier this month in Iraq contained sarin, a U.S. defense official said yesterday (see GSN, May 18).

The presence of sarin in the bomb, which was made from an artillery shell, had been earlier detected through less reliable field-testing, according to the Associated Press. The U.S. military has placed a high priority on determining the origin of the shell, which was designed to disperse the nerve agent, the defense official said. There were no markings on the shell to indicate that it contained chemical weapons, military officials said (Associated Press/USA Today, May 26).