Several chinks in the armour of the international movement against chemical and biological weapons emerged from a seminar in Pretoria on Thursday.
One of these related to a lack of capacity to give emergency assistance in case of chemical weapon attacks, said Jean Pascal Zanders, director of the BioWeapons Prevention Project, a non-governmental body.
He said the Organisation for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons still had no such ability. The body comprises 151 countries which have ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), a disarmament treaty.
A second concern was fears that both Russia and the United States would probably not meet deadlines for the destruction of their chemical arsenals under the CWC. Both countries subscribe to the convention.
Another weakness in the fight against chemical weapons was the failure of some key states to ratify the CWC, described by Zanders as a central tool for the prevention of chemical warfare.
They included North Korea, Syria, Israel, Iran, some former Soviet republics and a quarter of African states.
These countries would remain outside the ambit of the five-year-old treaty as long they refrained from ratifying it, Zanders said.
The seminar was hosted by the Institute for Security Studies and the Centre for Conflict Resolution. According to Zanders, the perception of an increased threat of
biological warfare had an adverse impact on international co-operation to get rid of such weapons.
Countries tended to fear they might reveal their vulnerabilities by co-operating with others, and expose themselves to exploitation. Zanders said there had been an emergence of defensive biological weapons programmes in some countries, motivated by the fear that there were renewed offensive programmes.
”In times of crisis these (the defensive programmes) could easily flip over into offensive programmes.”
While it was important for governments to make independent assessments of their capabilities, international co-operation was essential, Zanders said.
On this continent, the African Union could establish a central agency for policy and warnings on security risks. Common standards to identify and interpret threats could be established on a regional level.
”Africa is increasingly involved in and a victim of international terrorism.”
The continent was also increasingly involved in peacekeeping operations where its soldiers might have to cope with strange diseases and biological warfare, Zanders said.
Preventative measures could — and should — be put in place that could largely deal with the threat of biological warfare. These included devising emergency procedures, stockpiling medical equipment, training emergency staff, and conducting cross-border exercises, Zanders said. – Sapa