Kenya confirms anthrax in envelope mailed from the U.S.

Associated Press WriterNAIROBI, Kenya (AP) -- White powder in a package mailed from Atlanta to a Kenyan doctor has tested positive for anthrax spores, health officials said Thursday, the first proven case of tainted mail outside the United States since the Sept. 11 attacks.

The package was sent by a relative of the doctor, said Dr. Julius Meme of the health ministry. However, when the doctor asked the relative what the substance was, the relative said he knew nothing about any powder, Meme said. The package was also damp.

Health Minister Sam Ongeri told reporters that the unidentified doctor, who lives in Nairobi, and four family members "may have come into contact" with the spores and were being tested, but they are "not in danger." The powder was undergoing further tests at a government lab, he said.

White powder was found in two other letters -- one to an official with the U.N. Environment Program in Nairobi and the other to a Kenyan businessman in the central town of Nyeri, Ongeri said. Those letters were also being tested at the state-run Kenya Medical Research Institute, he said.

The package that tested positive for anthrax had been mailed Sept. 8 from Atlanta and was received in Kenya on Oct. 9, Ongeri said. It was opened on Oct. 11.

The package contained samples of cloth and was sent via Express Mail Service, said Meme.

The letter to the U.N. office was in a brown, tatty envelope bearing a Pakistani postage stamp in the upper lefthand corner, said Torre Brevik, a spokesman for the environmental program. It was addressed in blue ink to a UNEP employee, whom he would not identify.

In the upper righthand corner, where the postage stamp should have been, the word "immaculate" was written in blue ink.

UNEP is headquartered in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital.

The Kenyan government set up a task force that included representatives from the health ministry, the postal service and the Atlanta-based U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is to issue a report on Friday.

"We would like to ask all Kenyans not to panic, but to remain calm. The government has the capacity and capability to deal with the situation," Ongeri said.

Anthrax is not contagious and can be treated with antibiotics. It is endemic in this East African nation, infecting people who come in contact with contaminated meat or hides, Ongeri said.

In the United States, five people are known to have contracted anthrax and dozens more have been exposed. The first confirmed case occurred at a tabloid newspaper in Florida.

The anthrax attacks have caused jitters worldwide. There have been hundreds of scares and hoaxes, but before the announcement in Kenya, no cases outside the United States had tested positive.

In France on Thursday, at least 19 people were hospitalized after white powder turned up at the National Assembly in Paris and at a post office in the eastern city of Nancy. The substances were being tested.

Also Thursday, an envelope containing white powder was received by the U.S. Consulate in Berlin, officials said. Two similar letters were sent to U.S. installations this week, and another was sent to the Environment Ministry; all were being tested, officials said.

In Greece, the health ministry was closed Thursday after an employee opened an envelope containing powder addressed to former U.S. ambassador Nicholas Burns and a note that said "death," police said. It was not immediately clear how the letter ended up at the ministry building.

Burns ended his stint in Athens earlier this year and is now the U.S. ambassador to NATO.

In Beijing, government health workers disinfected people who came into contact with suspicious substances enclosed in a letter sent to an American firm, China's Foreign Ministry said Thursday. The substance was being tested. The letter contained information about the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement.

A car bomb exploded in 1998 outside the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, almost at the same time as an explosion at the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania. The blasts killed 231 people, including 12 Americans. Osama bin Laden, the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States, has been indicted in the embassy bombings.

Three bin Laden followers convicted in those bombings were sentenced Thursday in New York to life in prison without parole.