Biological and Chemical Weapons

Biological Weapons Treaty Reconvenes After Year-long Recess

CBW Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 1 (January 2003)

The Fifth Review Conference of the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC) reconvened on 11 November 2002 in Geneva with the goal of concluding the work begun nearly a year before. In December 2001, the conference recessed for a year after the US representatives called for the disbanding of the group tasked with developing a compliance protocol for the treaty. Member states decided against this alternative, opting instead to approve a limited proposal, presented by Chairman Tibor Toth, that calls for a meeting in each of the next three years.

Each year, a two-week expert group meeting focusing on technical issues will be followed by a week-long meeting of States Parties to review the experts’ work and make decisions. The annual meetings will then culminate at the Sixth Review Conference to be held in 2006.

The BWC, which entered into force in 1975, currently has 146 member states and 17 states that have signed, but not ratified the convention. The BWC forbids the production, stockpiling, acquisition, and transfer of biological weapons. Unlike the Chemical Weapons Convention, however, there are no provisions within the treaty to monitor compliance. In 1994, a Special Conference of States Parties established the Ad Hoc Group to strengthen the treaty’s verification mechanisms by developing a legally binding means to gauge compliance with treaty commitments.

At a session of the Ad Hoc Group in July 2001, the United States rejected the group’s draft compliance protocol, which called for member states to declare certain dual-purpose and research, testing, and production facilities and allow for on-site visits to clarify ambiguities surrounding those declarations, as well as challenge inspections of purported illegal activity. US officials refused to accept the plan, arguing that this approach would not produce reliable monitoring results and would also have negative impacts on the pharmaceutical industry and US national security. No consensus could be reached at the Fifth Review Conference. In the final hours, the US proposed that the Ad Hoc Group be disbanded; a suggestion that resulted in widespread dissension amongst the BWC members. Chairman Toth suspended the conference until the following year to allow tensions to cool.

The program of work until the next review conference will be to address, albeit briefly, several major issues. In 2003, the three-week session will focus on creating domestic penal legislation for individuals who break the BWC’s prohibitions, as well as means of creating and enforcing stricter regulations for handling dangerous pathogens and toxins. The following year, the topics will be methods of investigating purported bio-weapon use and/or suspicious disease occurrences and heightening international human, animal, and plant disease surveillance. Finally, in 2005, members will discuss a code of conduct for scientists. The Sixth Review Conference, for which a date is not yet set, will consider the work produced from all of these meetings and debate further action.

While all parties accepted the proposal, several nations expressed disappointment at not having substantially strengthened the Convention, while conceding that the limited meeting schedule was preferable to ceasing all activity in this area until 2006. The Fifth Review Conference officially closed on Friday, November 15, 2002.

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