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Georgia
nuclear

Updated March 2009

Introduction
redline

Independent for three years (1918-1921) following the Russian revolution, Georgia was forcibly incorporated into the USSR until the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. As part of its Soviet legacy, Georgia possesses a decommissioned nuclear reactor and three nuclear research institutes, as well as a number of military bases contaminated with radioactive waste. Nonproliferation issues concerning Georgia stem primarily from the area of export controls.Georgia does not possess or produce nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons, but the country's industrial and medical sectors use components that could also be used in WMD systems. 
на русском (in Russian)

 Mar. 11, 2009
 Mar. 11, 2009

Nuclear

Georgia is home to three nuclear research institutes.The Andronikashvili Institute of Physics in Tbilisi houses a nonoperational IRT-M research reactor.All fresh and spent fuel was transferred from the reactor facility to Scotland in April 1998 under a multinational effort known as Operation Auburn Endeavor.The High Energy Physics Institute in Tbilisi is not known to house fissile material.The Sukhumi I. Vekua Institute of Physics & Technology (SIPT) was relocated from Sukhumi to Tbilisi due to the Abkhazian conflict.There are reports that SIPT once housed isotope production reactors and/or 2kg of 90% enriched uranium, though the whereabouts of the HEU is not known. Georgia is party to both the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).In addition, on 6 June 2003, Georgia ratified an Additional Protocol to the NPT.

See Georgia Nuclear Profile

Biological

Georgia acceded to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC) on 22 May 1996. There is no evidence to suggest that Tbilisi possesses or is developing biological weapons. During the Soviet era, some vaccine manufacturing facilities in Georgia that were part of the Soviet Anti-Plague system possessed dual-use biological weapons production capabilities. The Biokombinat Production facility, for example, manufactured vaccines for sheep pox, swine plague, and sheep brucellosis, but also doubled as a biological weapons research facility. Under the 30 December 2002 agreement between the United States and Georgia on cooperation in the area of prevention of proliferation of technology, pathogens and expertise related to the development of biological weapons, all dual-use equipment and selected buildings at Biokombinat were eliminated.. Also, the U.S. Department of Defense through its contractor Bechtel National Inc. completed construction of the Epidemiological Monitoring Station at a Ministry of Agriculture laboratory in Tbilisi and installed the Pathogen Asset Control System at the National Center for Disease Control and the interim Central Reference Laboratory (CRL). Meanwhile, construction of the CRL and repository in Tbilisi and the Epidemiological Monitoring Station at the Kutaisi Regional Veterinary Laboratory in Kutaisi continues.

Chemical

Georgia is a founding member of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). There is no evidence to suggest that Georgia possesses or is pursuing chemical weapons.

Missile

Georgia subscribes to the International Code of Conduct against Ballistic Missile Proliferation and does not possess ballistic missile systems.

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CNSThis material is produced independently for NTI by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of and has not been independently verified by NTI or its directors, officers, employees, agents. Copyright © 2009 by MIIS.

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