BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Danish troops have found suspicious mortar shells in southern Iraq that officials believe contain blister agents, the United States and Denmark announced Saturday.
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, a U.S. Army spokesman, said Saturday that the 120 mm mortars were filled with liquid.
The shells are at least 10 years old, and a U.S. Army official said he suspects the ordnance was surplus from the Iran-Iraq war in the mid-1980s. Blister agents are used in chemical weapons.
A release on the Danish army operational command Web site said that in a routine collection of old ammunition, the 36 heavy mortar grenades were found in a dried-up marsh Friday. They were buried and packed in plastic.
Suspicious shells found in southern Iraq