By Chris Schneidmiller
Global Security Newswire
WASHINGTON — The United States does not anticipate eliminating its chemical weapons stockpile before 2017, five years beyond the final deadline set by international treaty, officials said yesterday (see GSN, April 13). The original deadline for completion of chemical weapons disposal was April 29, 2007. The Bush administration tomorrow plans to submit a request to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for a five-year extension allowed under the Chemical Weapons Convention. U.S. officials on Thursday are scheduled to informally brief the organization’s Executive Council on the request. That body, in turn, would make a recommendation to the full treaty membership for a decision at its conference in December, officials from the State and Defense departments said at a briefing yesterday. “The fact that we’re asking for an extension does not mean in any way that the United States is not committed to full destruction of our stockpile,” a State Department official said. The briefing follows Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s announcement last week to Congress that the United States expects to have eliminated 66 percent of its chemical stockpile by 2012. The United States as of March 31 had incinerated or chemically neutralized 10,103 metric tons of weapons agent, roughly 36 percent of the 27,768-ton stockpile of mustard, VX and other materials. Processing at the Johnston Atoll and Aberdeen chemical agent disposal facilities is finished; work is under way at five sites and two depots have yet to begin building their destruction facilities. The full U.S. disposal project is now estimated to cost between $32 billion and $34 billion. That is generally consistent with earlier projections, an official said today. Of all the treaty states known to possess chemical weapons, only Albania is expected to meet the 2007 deadline by eliminating its 16-ton stockpile, officials said (see GSN, Oct. 22, 2004). Russia has requested an extension to 2012, and publicly says it intends to meet that deadline for disposal of the world’s largest stockpile of chemical weapons. Officials at the briefing yesterday said it is unlikely that the full 40,000-metric-ton arsenal would be processed by that point. Libya, India and South Korea are all expected to request extensions of less than five years for “different technical reasons,” the State Department official said. An extension request is also expected for disposal of weapons abandoned in China by the Japanese army at the end of World War II (see GSN, April 17). “What I think this illustrates is that the business of destroying stockpiles is proving to be a lot more technically complex and politically complex than the drafters of the treaty imagined,” the State Department official said. A spokeswoman for the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said today she could not comment on the extension request because the agency has not received official notification from the U.S. government. The overall complexity of chemical weapons disposal has contributed to the need for an extension, along with a number of specific issues, U.S. officials said. These include: delays in obtaining required operating permits; meeting additional community emergency preparedness requirements; extended work stoppages for maintenance and changeovers to disposal of different agents; investigation and resolution of problems; developing protocols for improved operational safety; and challenges in handling decaying munitions. “I think those are all true. I would add underfunding, particularly at Blue Grass and Pueblo,” said Paul Walker, director of the Legacy Program at Global Green USA. Preparation of the yet-unbuilt neutralization facilities at the Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado and Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky was ordered to be accelerated following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Cost projections that far exceeded earlier estimates — by $1 billion at Pueblo alone — brought the projects to an extended halt (see GSN, Feb. 27). Funding has resumed for design and eventual construction, but disposal is not expected to begin at both sites until 2011 (see related GSN story, today). The two sites, along with operating incinerators at Tooele in Utah, Anniston in Alabama, Umatilla in Oregon and Pine Bluff in Arkansas, are expected to finish their work sometime after 2012. Blue Grass is expected to be the last operating disposal facility. There are 475 metric tons of sarin, VX and mustard agents to be neutralized at the site. “It will probably go beyond [2017] but we don’t have a good projection yet,” a Defense Department official said. Political misjudgments might also be hampering efforts, Walker said. Some U.S. lawmakers have joined local and state officials in New Jersey and Delaware, in vowing to block the planned transport of neutralization wastewater from the Newport Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Indiana for final processing in New Jersey. The Army could have avoided the trouble and already started disposing of waste by building an on-site processor, Walker said. The Defense Department official said transportation is still the plan for the Newport waste. A forthcoming report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is not expected to detail any adverse effects from such shipments, the official said. Craig Williams, director of the anti-incineration Chemical Weapons Working Group, argued that the government could have avoided slowdowns by building only neutralization sites rather than five incinerators. Neutralizers have fewer parts that could break down and are more loosely integrated than incinerators, so problems in one component are less likely to halt the entire process, he said. “In this case, simplicity is good,” he said. The extended schedule allows more time for accidents or leaks of deteriorating chemical munitions, Walker said. Leaking weapons are reported regularly at storage depots, as are fires that ignite during disposal of rockets drained of chemical agent. However, there have not been any major accidents, Walker said. The Pentagon says its weapons storage and disposal sites include multiple safety features intended to protect the environment and public. Early disposal efforts have focused on the most lethal agents such as VX and sarin, according to a fact sheet released yesterday, leaving less dangerous materials for the latter stages of the process. Both Walker and Williams said they appreciated the candor on the anticipated finishing date for chemical weapons disposal. They noted, though, the mutability of such dates. The first U.S. law calling for elimination of chemical stocks, approved in 1985, scheduled completion for 1994, Williams said. Various subsequent finishing times have since come and gone. That work would continue after 2012 had been an unpublicized but foregone conclusion for some time, Walker said. A second Defense Department official denied that the agencies were “coming clean” about the missed deadline. “This is based on assessments that have been under way for quite a while and have been recently concluded,” the official said. “The secretary is being transparent about the results with both the Congress and the international community.” Such frankness could lead to action by the other treaty nations. Article 12 of the Chemical Weapons Convention allows for “Measures to Redress a Situation and to Ensure Compliance, Including Sanctions.” The article states only that member states could “restrict or suspend” a nation’s rights if it is found to be in violation of the treaty. The State Department official said other CWC members could demand greater transparency or more verification of the U.S. program, but that he did not foresee any harsher action. The United States will make its case for fair treatment by detailing the difficulties of the disposal project and the successes to date, officials said. “I would not expect penalties,” the State Department official said.
A U.S. Defense Department official who works with chemical weapons disposal efforts said yesterday that his office continues to support funding for the planned processing facility at the Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado (see GSN, March 29). Dale Klein, assistant to the defense secretary for nuclear and chemical and biological defense programs, spoke during a panel session in Pueblo that also included Senator Wayne Allard (R-Colo.), according to the Pueblo Chieftain. Allard and Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) recently sent a letter to the Pentagon seeking commitment for ongoing funding for construction of chemical neutralization sites at Pueblo and the Blue Grass Army Depot in Kentucky. “We want to makes sure that DOD toes the line on these chemical weapons demilitarization projects,” the letter states. “We also are expecting the department to provide us with a detailed schedule for the work and completion of the Pueblo project, the Blue Grass project in Kentucky, and all the other demilitarization sites in general.” Defense Undersecretary Kenneth Krieg is likely to approve redesigns of the Colorado and Kentucky facilities in August, according to U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency chief Mike Parker. “Undersecretary Krieg is committed to fully funding both Pueblo and Blue Grass,” he said. The Pentagon should reconsider plans to ship explosives and wastewater from neutralization of chemical weapons at Pueblo to other locations for final disposal, said Ross Vincent, a member of the Colorado Chemical Demilitarization Citizens’ Advisory Commission. “It’s going to be more difficult than people think,” he said. “Those two issues could be major red flags down the road.” Parker said the government has proven its ability to safely transport wastewater from mustard agent neutralization at the Aberdeen Chemical Agent Disposal Facility in Maryland, the Chieftain reported. “It was transported by almost 1,000 truckloads across three states free of any incidents,” he said. “There are certain risks associated with on-site treatment that need to be acknowledged,” namely the use of new technology that could delay work (John Norton, Pueblo Chieftain, April 18).
The U.S. Senate Dirksen Office Building in Washington was closed yesterday afternoon after a sensor indicated the presence of a nerve agent, the Associated Press reported (see GSN, Feb. 10). An alarm at around 4:50 p.m. indicated there was a suspicious substance near a post office site in the basement of the building. Tests determined that the substance was harmless and the building was reopened at about 8:15 p.m. Ambulances and fire trucks responded to the Capitol after the initial alarm. Decontamination tents were constructed and three hazardous material teams were on the scene (Associated Press, April 18).
Authorities in Japan today raided 11 sites operated by the cult that carried out the deadly 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system, Agence France-Presse reported (see GSN, March 30). Police questioned members in hopes of learning whether the Aum Supreme Truth plans any action related to the pending execution of former leader Shoko Asahara. The Tokyo High Court last month rejected an appeal by Asahara’s lawyers, who subsequently appealed that decision. After the subway attacks that killed 12 people, the group ousted Asahara and renamed itself Aleph. However, some members’ belief in Asahara “appears to be still strong,” said Justice Minister Seiken Sugiura. “The number of believers is not declining while activities are still going on. We still need to be fully on alert” (Agence France-Presse, April 18).
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