Statement by the Representative of the Delegation of the Russian Federation at the Thematic Debate on "Other WMDs" in the First Committee of the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly, New York, 22 October 2024
23 October 2024 14:05
1980-23-10-2024
Madam Chair,
The issues of protection against various biological risks and threats are becoming increasingly prominent on the international agenda. In this context, we attach particular importance to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) as one of the pillars of the international security architecture. The Convention was the first international treaty to outlaw an entire category of weapons of mass destruction.
Nowadays, as in 1975, its aim is still relevant: to exclude completely the possibility of biological agents being used as weapons. The Russian Federation, as the Depositary State of the BTWC, has consistently implemented all its provisions in full. However, even after half a century of the Convention's existence, we cannot say that the problem of biological weapons has been completely removed from the agenda of the world community.
The legitimate questions officially raised by the Russian Federation with regard to the revealed facts about a military-biological program being implemented in Ukraine in violation of the BTWC with support of the Pentagon and its affiliates, including private companies, remain unanswered. The analysis of projects carried out in Ukrainian laboratories leads to the conclusion that biological weapons components were being developed in close proximity to the Russian territory. For our country, any such activity by military representatives of third states or affiliated organizations at biological sites is a direct threat to national security. This unacceptable situation needs to be addressed and confirms the urgency of strengthening the BTWC regime through consolidated efforts of the international community.
First and foremost, work with a view to developing a universal, legally binding and non-discriminatory protocol that would cover all the BTWC articles and provide for an effective verification mechanism should be resumed. Efforts to develop such an instrument, which would guarantee reliable implementation of the BTWC and prevent its violation, have been blocked by the US since 2001. This, coupled with the Ukrainian case, only increases suspicions about Washington's biological-military activities around the world under the guise of cooperation for peaceful purposes.
Russia intends to continue its active efforts to strengthen the BTWC within the dedicated Working Group established by the decision of the Ninth Review Conference of the BTWC. We believe that Russian initiatives aimed at genuinely strengthening the Convention regime are fully in line with the Group's agenda. These include creating mobile biomedical units; establishing a Scientific Advisory Committee; enhancing confidence-building measures within the BTWC by providing States Parties to the Convention with information on biological-military activities outside national territory and animal vaccine-production facilities; and establishing a BTWC mechanism to investigate cases involving alleged violations of obligations under the Convention.
Yet the proposal on Article VI of the BTWC in no way calls into question the independent status of the UN Secretary-General's Mechanism for Investigation of Alleged Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons (SGM). On the contrary, these international instruments could complement each other for the purpose of implementing the BTWC and the 1925 Geneva Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare.
The expertise and technical capacity of the SGM need to be strengthened. Special attention should be paid to the Mechanism's basic principles and procedures, which, except for the technical annexes (partly amended in 2007), have not been updated since their approval by UNGA resolution 45/57C of 4 December 1990. Having been developed more than 30 years ago, they do not fully meet the current realities of chemical and biological security. New challenges and threats have emerged, as well as a range of technical and methodological innovations that could contribute to a more effective SGM.
In 2023, Sergey Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, sent a message to United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres calling for a review of the existing SGM principles and procedures with a view to updating them. Several states submitted similar proposals to the UN Secretary-General. The Joint Statement in Support of the Efforts to Strengthen the SGM initiated by Russia and made on behalf of a group of countries in the First Committee contains a similar call. We hope that the UN Secretary-General will promptly proceed with the review with the help of expert consultants and taking into account the proposals from Member States. We are committed to most actively contribute to this work.
Madam Chair,
The Russian Federation was one of the founding States of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction (CWC) and has consistently supported its strengthening. Our country has faithfully and fully complied with the obligations assumed under this international treaty.
At the same time, the attempts by the US-led Euro-Atlantic allies to reshape the arms control and WMD non-proliferation regimes that have been developed over the years, resulting in the unacceptable situation within the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), are of serious concern. This once highly reputable and purely technical international organisation has already been turned by Western countries into a tool for furthering their geopolitical interests in the Middle East and beyond. This concerns, first of all, the Syrian "chemical dossier" fictionalized by the West and the illegitimate "attribution" imposed on the OPCW in violation of the CWC to identify those responsible for the use of toxic chemicals and chemical warfare agents, with the falsification of facts in order to assign responsibility for the numerous "chemical" provocations by the Syrian opposition to the legitimately elected Syrian authorities. These destructive actions by the West resulted in a split within the OPCW and its loss of independent status and authority as a universally recognised expert institution in the field of chemical disarmament and non-proliferation.
The Russian Federation has consistently opposed the unbridled politicisation by Western countries of the activities of the OPCW, which is increasingly moving away from its initial purpose as a key instrument of chemical disarmament and non-proliferation. We intend to continue making every effort, together with our partners and like-minded actors, to restore the spirit of consensus within the OPCW and the authority of this international organisation.
We intend to continue making every effort, together with our partners and other like-minded actors, to achieve consensus on all issues on the OPCW agenda and to restore the authority of this international organization.
We strongly urge the States Parties to the CWC who care about the fate of this once successful disarmament mechanism to prevent final degradation of the OPCW.
Thank you.
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