According to a new CIA report, there are “several plausible ways” to use electromagnetic pulses in such a targeted manner. Several U.S. diplomats living in Havana have complained of puzzling headaches, hearing loss, dizziness and nausea as of 2016.
According to estimates by US intelligence services, some cases of the so-called Havana syndrome could have been deliberately triggered by American diplomats using a type of electromagnetic radiation. There are “several plausible ways” to use electromagnetic pulses of a specific frequency spectrum in such a targeted manner, according to a report published by intelligence coordinator Avril Haines and CIA director William Burns on Wednesday. With certain devices, such signals could be transmitted hundreds of meters in air and, with some loss, through most building materials.
The use of such radiation sources could “plausibly” explain the main health problems associated with Havana syndrome, according to the partially blackened summary of a secret expert report. Ultrasound use could also explain the symptoms, but such devices could only harm targets that are in close proximity. Other hypotheses such as the use of chemical or biological substances are not plausible given the symptoms observed, it said.
According to US media reports, the foreign intelligence service CIA recently stated that it cannot be assumed that a global campaign by a foreign country was responsible for the mysterious diseases. Most of the cases were due to previously undiagnosed diseases or stress, it said. However, there are also cases that cannot be explained.
The new report also said that some of the cases “cannot be easily explained by environmental influences or diseases and could be due to external stimuli.” The spatially limited and sudden occurrence of the symptoms speaks for a spatially and temporally limited external trigger. For the report, more than 1,000 classified documents from various US agencies and ministries were analyzed, as well as reports from those affected and their medical records, as the summary said.
Dozens of US diplomats and their families living in Havana have complained of mysterious headaches, hearing loss, dizziness and nausea as of 2016. The embassy staff there was then reduced to a minimum. Similar complaints were later reported elsewhere in the world. The US government has not ruled out that this could be some kind of attack – but it has always emphasized that it does not know what is behind it.