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Russia: Former Scientists May Have Helped Rogue States A former Soviet biological weapons official said some former Soviet biological weapon personnel may have gone to work for rogue states in the 1990s, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, Nov. 30, 2001). “When we talk about these rogue states being familiar with biological weapons, that may be due to some participation of ours,” said Igor Domaradskij, former deputy director of the State Research Center for Applied Microbiology in Obolensk, about 85 kilometers south of Moscow. “I know that in the mid-90s several quite prominent scientists — genetic scientists whom I do not want to name — prepared personnel for Iran,” Domaradskij said. “But I think that ended several years ago.” There are about 7,000 former Soviet biological scientists of “critical proliferation risk,” said Amy Smithson, of the Henry Stimson Center. The United States and other Western countries have tried to address this problem through nonproliferation programs, the AP reported. One such program, the International Science and Technology Center, works to finance peaceful research for former Soviet scientists so they are not tempted to sell their knowledge and skills to rogue states, according to the AP. The program conducts 35 research programs at the Obolensk facility and has devoted more than $4 million dollars in salary supplements and other support. Some former scientists who had left Obolensk returned due to the ISTC’s efforts, said Obolensk’s first deputy director Vladimir Volkov. Supplements add $20 to $35 dollars per day to the scientists’ pay, which averaged $83 a month at Obolensk last year, the AP reported. The program has reached about half of the scientists of concern, said ISTC Deputy Executive Director Randall Beatty. “We know for a fact that a number who had been receiving e-mails from Iran or Iraq or Pakistan are now very sensitive and cut off all communication with these organizations … because they want to be eligible to participate in programs like the ISTC,” Beatty said. Iranian agents, however, still try to contact scientists from smaller facilities, said a U.S. Defense Department official. “That effort has not stopped,” the official said. The ISTC spends about a quarter to a third of its $75 million yearly grant on biotechnology research programs, mainly focused on public health concerns, the AP reported. Smithson said, however, that the funding needs to be at least doubled or tripled (see GSN, Jan. 9). “There isn’t sufficient funding in the program yet to keep even the critical proliferation risk bioweaponeers gainfully and peacefully engaged and to help them adjust their skills and add skills that would enable them to become self-sufficient in the commercial marketplace,” she said (Ingram/Shargorodsky, Associated Press, Jan. 9).
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