PRESS RELEASE

6 November 2002

A 10-minute international conference on controlling biological weapons proliferation?

Representatives of 145 State Parties to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) will gather in Geneva on Monday 11^th November to resume talks about how to strengthen the 30-year- old agreement – but it may be a very short meeting.

Set against the backdrop of the anthrax attacks in the United States, the possibility of terrorist dissemination bacteria and viruses, the fear of Iraq using biological weapons and the Russian forces use of narcotic gas to end the Moscow theatre siege – could there be a better time for the nations of the world to agree further legal mechanisms to halt their proliferation?

The President of the Review Conference, Tibor Toth from Hungary, suspended the Review Conference on December 7, 2001 following a demand from the United States that negotiations on a verification Protocol be halted. The proposed verification measures had taken 6 years to negotiate.

On September 2, 2002, John Bolton, Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security made it clear to members of the Western Group of Nations that the US Administration opposed the suggestion of holding talks on how to strengthen the BTCW between Review Conferences. His presentation called for “a very short RevCon…with the sole purpose and outcome of agreeing to hold a RevCon in 2006”. Reportedly, the U.S. argued for a 10-minute meeting in Geneva with no substantive discussion.  

This stance is not supported by the U.S.’s closest allies and Washington has apparently not offered any concessions in the run-up to next week’s meeting. Speaking for the European Union during the United Nations First Committee on September 30, Denmark listed specific issues that BTCW Member States could consider between RevCons. The British Government had proposed similar measures in its Green Paper of April 2002 and appears to favour efforts to stem the global proliferation of BW.

“If the reports that the U.S. is developing a new generation of ‘non-lethal’ weapons are accurate and that the UK Ministry of Defence has indeed agreed to co-operate on their research and development, it could undermine the Biological and Toxins Weapons Convention,” said BASIC Director Ian Davis.

Dr Davis will be attending the Biological and Toxins Weapons Conference in Geneva and can be contacted via the BASIC Office in London on +44-(0)20-7407-2977.

Suggested further reading on biological weapons and the Biological Weapons Convention: 

1. ‘Biological Weapons Review Uncertain’ by Oliver Meier in BASIC Reports, November 2002.

2. ‘Disease by Design: De-mystifying the Biological Weapons Debate’ by Michael Crowley, BASIC Research Report, November 2001

3. ‘Defence Chiefs seek to promote non-lethal biological weapons’ by Janine Roberts and Jean Eaglesham in the Financial Times, November 4, 2002.

4.  ‘Now for GM weapons’ by Jeremy Rifkin in the Guardian, September 27, 2001.

5. ‘Return to Geneva: The United Kingdom Green Paper’ by Graham S. Pearson, Department of Peace Studies, University of Bradford, June 2002.

6. ‘U.S. weapons secrets exposed’ by Julian Borger in the Guardian, October 29, 2002.