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Ukraine Chemical Weapons

US President Joe Biden warned 21 March 2022 that Russia may be considering using biological or chemical weapons against Ukraine. Biden said Russian President Vladimir Putin's "back is against the wall" because of unified support from Western countries for Ukraine. He warned that Putin may turn to more intense tactics. He said Putin is asserting that both Ukraine and the United States have biological and chemical weapons, which is "simply not true." He explained, "That's a clear sign he's considering using both of those."

Ukraine has no chemical weapons program, although some remnants of the Soviet chemical warfare infrastructure remained in Ukraine as of 1997. Ukrarine's territory was used by Soviet government for chemical weapons storage and testing prior to 1991. Ukraine returned all chemical weapons to Russia for elimination following independence. Ukraine is a signatory of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which requires countries to destroy all chemical weapons and prohibits developing, stockpiling, or using chemical weapons.

"Chemical Weapons" means: Toxic chemicals and their precursors, except where intended for purposes not prohibited under this Convention, as long as the types and quantities are consistent with such purposes; Munitions and devices, specifically designed to cause death or other harm through the toxic properties of those toxic chemicals specified in subparagraph (a), which would be released as a result of the employment of such munitions and devices. "Toxic Chemical" means: any chemical which through its chemical action on life processes can cause death, temporary incapacitation or permanent harm to humans or animals. This includes all such chemicals, regardless of their origin or of their method of production, and regardless of whether they are produced in facilities, in munitions or elsewhere.

Washington and Kiev have violated articles of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) as Ukrainian forces have used illegal munitions on the battlefield, Russian Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov claimed 18 March 2024. The head of Russia’s Nuclear, Chemical and Biological Protection Forces provided several examples of Kiev’s alleged use of banned chemical weapons and non-lethal chemical agents that he said were obtained from the US.

Kirillov claimed that Ukraine used drones to drop US-made gas grenades on December 28, 2023 containing “CS” compound – a chemical classified as a riot-control tool that irritates the eyes and upper respiratory tract, and can cause skin burns, respiratory paralysis and cardiac arrest when used in high concentrations. He said the delivery of such munitions by the US to Ukraine was a direct violation of the rules of the OPCW, which states that a country must “never, under any circumstances, transfer chemical weapons directly or indirectly to anyone.”

He also reported that, on June 15, 2023, Moscow’s forces were attacked by a drone carrying a container filled with chloropicrin, which is classified as a Schedule 3 compound under the Chemical Weapons Convention and is strictly prohibited – even for law enforcement purposes. The same chemical was also used by Kiev on August 3 and 11, 2023 near the village of Rabotino, according to Kirillov. The general also provided several examples of Kiev using toxic substances against Russian military personnel, as well as poisoning high-ranking officials such as the head of Russia’s Kherson Region Vladimir Saldo in August 2022.

Kirillov said Russian intelligence believes that Ukraine’s forces, under the guidance of its Western backers, are developing a new military tactic that would use a “chemical belt.” This would involve blowing up containers with hydrocyanic acid and ammonia to prevent an advance by Russian forces. He added that plans for such a large-scale use of toxic chemicals were evidenced by the fact that Kiev had asked the EU to supply it with hundreds of thousands of antidotes, gas masks and other personal protective equipment in 2024. That’s in addition to 600,000 ampules of organophosphorus antidotes, and 750,000 bottles of drugs for the detoxification of mustard gas, lewisite and hydrocyanic acid derivatives that were supplied by NATO countries in 2023.

“It is obvious that the volumes requested by Ukraine are excessive for a country that does not have chemical weapons,” Kirillov stated. There has been no response from the OPCW despite all of this evidence being presented to the organization four months ago, the general said, accusing it of being run by Washington as a tool to target its political opponents.

Russia’s false statements about chemical weapons attacks being prepared by Ukraine in the lead-up to their premeditated invasion are an example of disinformation staging false pretexts for war. The Russian government continued to conduct this sort of misinformation operation in a transparent attempt to justify the unjustifiable.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, called the Russian accusations “preposterous” and said the United States “does not develop or possess such weapons anywhere”. “Now that Russia has made these false claims, and China has seemingly endorsed this propaganda, we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, or to create a false flag operation using them,” she wrote on Twitter on 09 March 2022, adding: “It’s a clear pattern.”

On December 21, at an extended meeting of the board of the Russian Ministry of Defense, chaired by Vladimir Putin, the head of the ministry, Sergey Shoigu, made the following surprising statement: “We have established the presence of over 120 employees of American private military companies in the localities of Avdiyivka and Pryazovske in Donetsk region. They are equipping firing positions in residential buildings and critical infrastructure facilities, preparing Ukrainian special operations forces and radical armed groups for active hostilities. Tanks with an unidentified chemical agent were delivered to the cities of Avdiyivka and Krasnyi Lyman to carry out provocations.”

Russian disinformation channels instantly turned "tanks with an unidentified chemical agent" into "proven facts" of chemical weapons available to Kyiv and Ukraine’s alleged readiness to actually use them. Allegedly, this was supposed to happen with the help of American mercenaries Shoigu mentioned.

This was not the first time that Russia had accused Ukraine of fake chemical weapons, according to Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence Mariana Bezugla. Similar statements were made in 2016 and 2018. But today the scale of the informatics and its circumstances are special. "The attack is taking place in the context of growing Russian forces on Ukraine's borders and significant international tensions," she said.

The statements of the Minister of Defense of Russia about the alleged preparation of provocations in Donbass with the use of chemical weapons are another example of Russian disinformation, the Foreign Ministry of Ukraine said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine (MFA) called the statement of Russian Defense Minister Serhiy Shoigu that the US military allegedly brought chemical weapons to Donbas and was preparing a provocation insinuations. This was announced on 22 December 2021, Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko. "We categorically reject the insinuations towards Ukraine made during the meeting of the board of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. for possible further provocations of its troops on Ukrainian territory, " said Nikolenko.

Shoigu's statement was called untrue by the United States. According to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, Sergei Shoigu's statement about the provocation with chemical weapons is completely untrue. Moreover, US State Department spokesman Ned Price called on Russia to "stop using false, inciting rhetoric" and take steps to de-escalate the situation. "Contrary to statements by Russia's defense minister, Russia and its representatives are responsible for escalating tensions, not Ukraine or the United States," he wrote.

On December 24, the international intelligence community InformNapalm published the Report on information countermeasures, which may be a document for internal use drawn up by the so-called “ministry of information of the DPR.” In the paper, propagandists admit they are the ones behind the fake story involving chemical weapons. The most recent of the 54 “information subversions” in 2021, on which Donetsk Goebbelses report to their Russian handlers, is “preparation for the publication (once a special order is issued) of disinformation and staged photographs on the shipment of chemical weapons to the area near the contact line by Ukrainian military servicemen together with American and NATO specialists.”

Then, throughout January, the Russian media actively covered the topic of the chemical attack in Donbass. The so-called "spies" of the terrorist organizations of the Luhansk People's Republic / DPR actively visited the propagandists of Skabeeva, Solovyov and others, who spoke about "provocations planned by Ukraine together with the United States." In particular, "chemical weapons" are stored in army depots in Balaklia (Kharkiv region), Lyman and Priazovsky (Donetsk region). And the direct use of an unnamed combat toxin, which "causes botulism" in the victims, is planned near Avdiivka. On 04 March 2022, the website www.naturalnews.com posted that the United States manufactured chemical weapons in Ukraine near the Russian border, htough they were evidentlly unable to distinguish between chemical and biological weapons. This website also published a discussion of the " “trifecta” of death science weapons which are now aimed at humanity. What I’m calling the “death science trifecta” consists of the coronavirus (biological weapons), 5G towers (electromagnetic weapons) and vaccines (chemical weapons). In combination, they are designed to enslave and then exterminate most human beings living today." The website is also warning about fluoridation of water.

On February 23, 2022, the Russian Federation military, at the direction of Vladimir Putin, began a premeditated brutal assault on the people of Ukraine without provocation, without justification, and without necessity, making outlandish, false, and baseless claims that Ukraine was about to invade and launch a war against Russia and that Ukraine was prepared to use chemical weapons, and that Ukraine had committed genocide.

Russia is extremely concerned that nationalists in Ukraine may use chemical weapons. This was stated by the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the OPCW Alexander Shulgin, speaking at the 99th session of the Executive Council of the organization.

Nationalists are preparing provocations in Ukraine using toxic substances to accuse Russia of allegedly using chemical weapons, for this, about 80 tons of ammonia were delivered to the village of Zolochev northwest of Kharkov, said the official representative of the Russian Defense Ministry, Major General Igor Konashenkov on 09 March 2022.

Polish President Andrzej Duda openly issued a challenge. "If [Russian President Vladimir Putin] uses any weapons of mass destruction (WMD) then this will be a game changer," he told the BBC on 13 March 2022. "For sure, [NATO's] North Atlantic alliance and its leaders, led by the United States, will have to sit at the table and they will really have to think seriously what to do because then it starts to be dangerous," Duda said.

When DW asked Stoltenberg on 15 March 2022 whether such an action would change NATO's position, the NATO chief stuck to the script. "The president of the United States and other allies also made it very clear that if they use chemical weapons, there will be a high price to pay,” he said. "But I will not speculate about any military response from the NATO side except for saying very clearly that NATO's main responsibility is to make sure that we defend and protect all allies, he added.

NATO doesn't have chemical weapons, but it might want to leave some ambiguity as to whether, if it's attacked with weapons of mass destruction, it might respond with its own weapons of mass destruction, which would not be chemical but would be nuclear.

On the evening of March 21, Ukrainian radicals carried out a provocation at the Sumykhimprom plant, which resulted in an ammonia leak. This was announced on 22 March 2022 by Dmitry Polyansky, First Deputy Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the UN. “On the evening of March 21, Ukrainian nationalists carried out a provocation in the city of Sumy, as a result of which ammonia leaked from the Sumykhimprom plant,” Polyansky said. The first deputy permanent representative of the Russian Federation to the UN said that the Russian military "did not plan or carry out strikes against facilities in Ukraine that store or produce toxic substances"

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on 24 March 2022 warned Russia against using chemical weapons in Ukraine. “Should Russia be preparing a false-flag operation in order to use such [chemical and biological] weapons [in Ukraine], this would be in violation of all rules, agreements and conventions,” he told journalists in Brussels.

Any use of chemical weapons by Russia in its war in Ukraine could cause contamination in NATO territory, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg warned 24 March 2022. “Any use of chemical weapons would fundamentally change the nature of the conflict – it would be a blatant violation of international law, and it will have widespread and severe consequences,” he said ahead of the NATO summit. “The seriousness of using chemical weapons, of course, becomes even more obvious knowing that there is a risk always for contamination… we can see the spread of chemical agents also into NATO territory,” he said.

The Ukrainian regime made attempts to convert Turkish Bayraktar UAVs into carriers of chemical and biological weapons, Igor Kirillov, head of the radiation, chemical and biological defense forces of the Russian Armed Forces, said on March 31 at a briefing on the results of an analysis of documents on US military biological activities in Ukraine.

Statement 05 April 2022 by the official representative of the NM of the LPR on the fact of the explosion of the APU of a tank with chemicals in the settlement FRONTIER. "Ukrainian nationalist formations, realizing the futility of conducting hostilities against the Lugansk People's Republic, before retreating from the occupied city of RUBEZHNOE, began to destroy chemical industry facilities. So, today, April 5, by blowing up a tank with hydrochloric acid in shop No. 1 of the Zarya production association, a cloud of a poisonous substance was spread in the factory district of the city, where over 10 thousand people live. The moment of detonation is calculated taking into account the wind rose that spreads chemicals to the liberated territory of the LPR in the direction of the settlement. KUDRYASHOVKA. Terrorist actions can lead to numerous casualties among the civilian population. Information about casualties among the civilian population is being specified. More than 40,000 tons of sulfuric, hydrochloric, nitric acid and ammonia remain in tanks on the territory of a hazardous chemical enterprise for the production of explosives, the explosion of which will cause irreparable damage to the region's ecology and destroy all life within a radius of 30 kilometers. The areas still under the control of the Armed Forces of Ukraine of settlements, LYSICHANSK, SEVERODONETSK, ZOLOTOE, SEVERSK, where more than 300 thousand civilians live, will suffer."

Kiev may resort to a chemical provocation as it becomes increasingly clear that the Ukrainian military is losing the war and growing desperate to maintain US support, according to Max Parry, an independent US journalist and geopolitical analyst.Parry's writing has appeared widely in alternative media in publications such as Unz Review, American Herald Tribune, Greanville Post, Off-Guardian, Dissident Voice, the Center for Research on Globalization, and more. "At some point the US is going to detach itself and Kiev may resort to last-ditch measures to preserve military aid from the West when it starts to abandon them," Parry said 09 July 2022 . "There is precedent for this in other theatres of the NATO-Russia proxy war when the Syrian opposition fell back on the use of such false flags when Damascus turned the corner in the Syrian war after the Russian intervention, and we could very well see extremist groups in Ukraine like the Azov Battalion employ such deceitful tactics."

There have been various conventional attacks in Ukraine which were blamed on Russia with zero evidence, the journalist noted. He refers to the alleged bombings of schools and hospitals, as well as the Bucha provocation which was staged by Ukrainian Nazi militants in order to accuse Moscow of targeting peaceful civilians. Each time, western governments and the mainstream press pinned the blame on Russia, Parry noted.

"In recent years, the OPCW has been exposed as a highly disreputable and untrustworthy organization that acts completely at the behest of the foreign policy objectives of the US-dominated international order and is certainly not an impartial watchdog working toward a world free of germ warfare," explained Parry.