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BWC: Conference Approves BW Nonproliferation Work Plan By David Ruppe The United States, among the celebrants, was cast by some delegations as the villain of the conference for discouraging the creation of an inspections mechanism to check compliance with the treaty, and for reportedly insisting on no changes to the plan offered this week. The parties approved a final decision of the 1972 treaty’s fifth review conference unamended, laying out a plan for annual meetings until the next review conference in 2006 to discuss a list of possible actions. “Thank you very much, this is a happy moment, said conference chairman Tibor Toth, after receiving unopposed support for the proposal and gaveling it into existence. Until the final hour of this conference, delegates and observers were on edge to see whether countries that had urged amendments to the plan might oppose it or possibly try to amend it when finally submitted for approval. A collection of developed countries, known as the Western Group that includes the United States, had indicated they would oppose the plan if amended (see GSN, Nov. 13). Toth, who during three days of closed discussions strove to develop a consensus, urged delegations that it was likely to pass only if submitted without changes (see GSN, Nov. 11). “I cannot hand out last minute goodies because all of those compromises have been built into the draft decision as it stands now,” Toth told Global Security Newswire. Toth was heartily applauded by delegates and reappointed to the presidency. “He’s done a fantastic job, presiding over this,” said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control Stephen Rademaker, the senior member of the U.S. delegation. “I’ve been watching him for the last several months and he has the patience of a saint and the victory today is in no small measure due to his extraordinary efforts.” The seeming inability of parties to agree to any kind of plan for cooperation for more than a year was seen by many diplomats and outside experts as a sign that the international community was unable to address biological weapon proliferation multilaterally. Many have said they were troubled by such a shortcoming in light of certain developments in the biotechnology field, the anthrax attacks in the United States and other high-profile terrorist attacks. The subjects that will be discussed at the meetings include: * adopting national measures to implement treaty prohibitions, including penal legislation; * creating national mechanisms to establish and maintain the security and oversight of pathogenic microorganisms and toxins; * enhancing international capabilities for responding to, investigating and mitigating the effects of cases of alleged use of biological or toxin weapons or suspicious outbreaks of disease; * strengthening and broadening national and international institutional efforts and existing mechanisms for the surveillance, detection, diagnosis and combating of infectious diseases affecting humans, animals and plants; and * developing, promulgating and adopting codes of conduct for scientists. U.S. Painted as Bad Guy Despite its adoption by consensus, Toth’s work plan was considered by most delegations, including other Western Group members, to be a poor alternative to a protocol negotiated over seven years that would have created a mechanism for assessing treaty compliance through inspections. Though not named specifically in statements following the vote, the United States was widely viewed as criticized by a collection of developing states known as the Nonaligned Movement and other states for its opposition to the protocol. Following the conference, those countries issued a statement criticizing the conference for not adopting “initiatives to strengthen the implementation of the convention.” “While standing at the verge of success, we were prevented from achieving a successful conclusion of the BWC Review Conference at our meeting in 2001,” it said (see GSN, Dec. 10, 2001). The NAM and others also referenced an April NAM statement expressing concern about “the growing resort to unilateralism and unilaterally imposed prescriptions.” The United States had withdrawn its support for the protocol mid-2001, and concerned about re-emerging discussions of a compliance mechanism, opposed a closing resolution for the conference last December, forcing Toth to suspend the conference until this week. This past September, U.S. diplomats told Western Group members they opposed holding any meetings before the next review conference in 2006 and preferred a “very short” resumed conference this week (see GSN, Sept. 6). In supporting the Toth proposal today, U.S. officials appeared to have taken a step back from that position. Toth, at a press conference today, said he and “many, many states’ parties, including close allies of the United States,” appealed to U.S. diplomats at the September meeting, saying “we might be able to do it in a way where we focus on not what was dividing us but what was bridging us.” Toth’s plan closely mirrored a U.S. proposal for discussions last year. A U.S. official disputed the NAM that characterization of unilateralist, observing the United States had joined in supporting the Toth proposal. “I heard those same comments ... I thought they were misdirected,” said Rademaker during a press conference. He cited successful U.S. efforts to gather U.N. support for pressing Iraq to allow weapons inspectors in (see GSN, Nov. 8). “It’s very difficult to accuse the United States of unilateralism,” Rademaker said. He also cited U.S. support for the Toth proposal today saying, “It’s nothing if not multilateral.” Bioweapons Development “Unverifiable” With other Western Group members apparently unwilling to pursue an inspection mechanism absent support from the United States, which has by far the world’s largest and most advanced biotechnology sector, the U.S. position effectively set the direction of the consensus-ruled treaty meeting. Rademaker explained U.S. opposition to the protocol, saying it is the U.S. view the treaty is “inherently unverifiable” using traditional arms control mechanisms. “It was the view of the United States a year ago that the inspection mechanism that was developed in the context of the protocol would not be effective in detecting the violations of the biological weapons convention,” he said. “At the same time, it was our conclusion that it would put at considerable risk intellectual property rights of pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms who might be subject to inspections under the protocol. It would put at risk legitimate biodefense activities carried out by the United States and other governments consistent with the Biological Weapons Convention,” he said. Rademaker said there was a concern that inspectors would misinterpret defensive biological research and development allowed by the treaty for an offensive program. “To conduct biodefense, you basically have to create a biological weapon to figure out how to defend against it,” he said. Later, when asked whether the United States was building biological weapons for defensive research, he clarified it was not weapons necessarily created for defensive purposes, but “agents” allowable by the treaty. The Bush administration has received some criticism from experts over secret programs officials said were defensive, including one to develop genetically altered variant of the anthrax bacteria to replicate a suspected Russian model, revealed by the New York Times last year. Rademaker also said the protocol would require nations to declare the agents they created for biological defense research, the release of which could tip off potential attackers. Perhaps anticipating criticism the United States had turned its back on biological weapons control, the U.S. team passed out to reporters a release describing U.S. efforts to combat the biological weapons threat. It cited the USA Patriot Act, major legislation increasing law enforcement capabilities, measures to improve national and global health system detection and response capabilities, and initiatives with other countries to prevent the spread the of technologies that could be used to make biological weapons. “The principal point that I hope you take away from this sheet is that the Biological Weapons Convention is not the only place that we can make progress … There are more ambitious ideas that we think can be pursued in other venues,” Rademaker said. Alternatives to Inspections Asked what mechanism could be used to confirm suspected biological weapons activities without treaty inspections, Rademaker said, “It’s the view of the United States that there is no formula that will work in all cases.” Rademaker called “prevention” the “single most effective step to combat the threat of biological weapons.” “In other words, not to discover biological weapons once they are in existence, but to prevent such programs from getting off the ground in the first place, and central to that policy is the effective enforcement of export controls,” he said.
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