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Updated March 2008
Biological Chronology
1920s - 2008
This annotated chronology is based on the data sources that follow each entry. Public sources often provide conflicting information on classified military programs. In some cases we are unable to resolve these discrepancies, in others we have deliberately refrained from doing so to highlight the potential influence of false or misleading information as it appeared over time. In many cases, we are unable to independently verify claims. Hence in reviewing this chronology, readers should take into account the credibility of the sources employed here.
Inclusion in this chronology does not necessarily indicate that a particular development is of direct or indirect proliferation significance. Some entries provide international or domestic context for technological development and national policymaking. Moreover, some entries may refer to developments with positive consequences for nonproliferation.
Late 1920s
Soviet Union starts BW activities. Most
elements of the early Soviet program are controlled by the Soviet
military.
1936
The Soviet Red Army's Scientific Medical Institute
receives Vozrozhdeniye Island under its authority and establishes the Open-Air
Test Site on the island. Vozrozhdeniye Island is located in the middle of the
Aral Sea, which straddles a section of the border between Kazakhstan and
Uzbekistan. The first experiments reportedly included the spread of tularemia
and related microorganisms.
1937
Due to security problems, all
personnel are evacuated from Vozrozhdeniye Island and the site is closed.
1949
Under the authority of the Main Directorate for Quarantine
Infections of the USSR Ministry of Health, the Soviet government establishes the
Anti-Plague Scientific Research Institute in the City of Almaty (former
Alma-Ata), Kazakhstan, designed to develop defensive measure against BW
agents.
1954
The Soviet government resumes BW testing on Vozrozhdeniye
Island after building a biological weapons test site, officially referred to as
"Aralsk-7." Vozrozhdeniye Island becomes the major proving ground in the Soviet
Union for the open-air testing of BW agents developed at various Soviet
facilities.
1958
The Soviet government establishes the Scientific
Research Agricultural Institute (NISKhI) in the settlement of Gvardeyskiy
outside the city of Otar, Kazakhstan, designed to work on microbial agents
harmful to livestock and plants. Though formally under the control of the Soviet
Ministry of Agriculture, the NISKhI is believed to be supervised by the Ministry
of Defense.
Early 1970s
The Soviet authorities begin creating a new
network of BW facilities parallel to its military system that were officially
designed to conduct civilian research, though they also serve as a cover for
military-related BW activities.
1970s
NISKhI possibly begins research
on anti-crop agents after it received orders from military authorities to study
the resistance of crops to various biological pathogens.
1972
The
USSR Council of Ministers establishes a secret Interagency Science and
Technology Council on Molecular Biology and Genetics consisting of
representatives from the MOD, the Soviet Academy of Sciences, the Ministry of
Health, and the Ministry of Agriculture. In the same year, the Soviet Union
signs the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC), and takes actions to
stop all offensive BW activities.
1973
The All-Union Production
Association "Biopreparat" is created by the Decree of the Central Committee of
the Soviet Communist Party and the USSR Council of Ministers, and is tasked with
implementing the programs approved by the Interagency Council.
1982
The Soviet authorities establish the Scientific
Experimental and Production Base (SNOPB) in the city of Stepnogorsk, Kazakhstan,
which is designed to test and certify pilot-scale and large-scale production
methods for BW agents developed in the laboratories of Biopreparat and the
Ministry of Defense, and to issue technical documentation and recommendations.
Although formerly under the control of the civilian Main Administration of
Microbiological Industry (Glavmikrobioprom), the SNOPB is a military-run BW
organization reporting to the Biopreparat authorities.
1991
Russia
begins evacuation of military personnel from Vozrozhdeniye Island.
1991-1992
Russia stops funding to the former Soviet BW centers
in Kazakhstan, closes their military programs, and abandons the sites. As a
result, all Soviet offensive and defensive BW programs on Kazakhstani territory
stop working. The Kazakhstani government, with assistance from the international
community, begins the process of dismantlement and/or conversion of the four BW
facilities on its territory.
18 January 1992
The Supreme Soviet of
newly independent Kazakhstan issues the edict "On Urgent Measures for
Radically Improving the Living Conditions of Aral Area Residents," under
which the Vozrozhdeniye military site is officially closed.
11 April 1992
Russian President Boris Yeltsin issues the edict No. 390 "On
Ensuring the Implementation of International Obligations Regarding Biological
Weapons," which orders that all offensive BW programs be shut down.
Following the decree, the Russian government declares that the Vozrozhdeniye
site is closed, the special structures will be dismantled, and within two or
three years, the island will be decontaminated and transferred to Kazakhstani
control.
1993
The Presidential Edict of the Republic of Kazakhstan
establishes the National Center for Biotechnology (NCB), which brings together
most of the former Soviet military and civilian biotechnology facilities in
Kazakhstan, among them the SNOPB and the NISKhI.
1993
The SNOPB is
reorganized into a joint stock company, Biomedpreparat, for which initial
funding is provided by the Kazakhstani State Program on Conversion. The facility
starts to produce various civilian products, though it encounters serious
economic difficulties.
1993-1994
The Kazakhstani government provides
financial support (totaling $1 million) to the SNOPB, though it appears to be
insufficient to fully reconstruct the facility for civilian needs or to provide
all of the former BW specialists with civilian jobs.
1994
U.S.-Kazakhstani cooperation begins under the U.S.
Department of Defense's Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) program. Under this
program, the U.S. government and U.S. partner firms provide investments to
Biomedpreparat totaling $5.8 million for joint U.S.-Kazakhstani production of
civilian products. However, the deal quickly fails because of mismanagement and
lack of infrastructure at the facility.
August 1995
Specialists from
the U.S. Department of Defense visit Vozrozhdeniye Island and confirm that the
experimental field lab has been dismantled, the site's infrastructure destroyed,
and military settlement abandoned.
3 October 1995
On 3 October 1995,
the U.S. Department of Defense and the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources
of Kazakhstan signed an Agreement on the Elimination of Infrastructure for
Weapons of Mass Destruction that covered projects under the Biological Weapons
Proliferation Prevention Program in Kazakhstan, including biological weapons
infrastructure elimination, Biosecurity and Biosafety (BS&S), and Threat
Agent Detection and Response (TADR) Network, and Cooperative Biological Research.
March 1996
U.S.-Kazakhstani intergovernmental negotiations
continue, but this time focusing on dismantlement and destruction of remaining
military equipment and systems at the Stepnogorsk facility (SNOPB), which still
can pose a proliferation risk.
December 1996
Kazakhstan and the United
States sign a contract designating the provision of funds for dismantling the
main and auxiliary equipment at Biomedpreparat designed for military
microbiological production.
1997
Following the Presidential Edict "On
Developing Small Business and Entrepreneurship," Biomedpreparat creates a number
of limited partnerships based on its subdivisions.
1997
U.S.
specialists study the condition of the buildings, equipment, and communications
infrastructure at Biomedpreparat, and conclude that a significant capital
investment will be required if the facility is to be used to produce
pharmaceuticals because the buildings do not meet international quality control
standards for pharmaceutical production.
1998
Information is revealed
regarding viable anthrax spores on Vozrozhdeniye Island, which causes a new wave
of concern regarding the environmental condition of the island.
October 2001
The U.S. Department of Defense and the Uzbek Ministry of Defense sign an
agreement allowing the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) program to spend up to
$6 million to prevent the proliferation of biological weapons materials and
technology from Vozrozhdeniye Island. (Most of the island falls under the
jurisdiction of Uzbekistan.) Because the CTR program is prohibited by law from
engaging in economic conversion or environmental remediation, the goals of the
Vozrozhdeniye project are to destroy the residual viable anthrax spores in the
burial pits and to dismantle the BW laboratory complex on the island.
8 December 2004
On 8 December 2004, the United States and Kazakhstan signed an
amendment to a bilateral agreement that will expand cooperation against the
threat of bioterrorism through the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction
Program. Nunn-Lugar assistance will have five key goals: (1) prevention of the
proliferation of biological weapons expertise through the cooperative biological
research program; (2) securing dangerous pathogens and strains by strengthening
biosafety and biosecurity at facilities; (3) consolidation of dangerous
pathogens at secure central repositories; (4) elimination of biological
weapons-related equipment and infrastructure; and (5) fortification of
Kazakhstan s biological threat agent detection and response system to protect
against bioterror attacks.
— "U.S., Kazakhstan Sign Nunn-Lugar Agreement Amendment to Prevent Biological Weapons Proliferation," 8 December 2004, States News Service; Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe, http://lexis-nexis.com.
2 August 2005
On 2 August 2005, the
government of Kazakhstan issued a Decree "On Certain Measures on
Biotechnologies Development in the Republic of Kazakhstan," which
reorganized the National Center for Biotechnology into a state enterprise and
placed it under the aegis of the Ministry of Education and Science of the
Republic of Kazakhstan.
23 August 2005
On 23 August 2005, the United
States and Kazakhstan signed an amendment to the agreement between the U.S.
Department of Defense and the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources of the
Republic of Kazakhstan concerning the elimination of infrastructure for weapons
of mass destruction.
16 November 2005
On November 16, 2005, the
Mazhilis (the lower house of the Kazakhstani parliament) approved a draft law
allowing Kazakhstan to join the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention. The
President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, is expected to sign the law after
the Senate, the upper house of the parliament, approves the
draft.
— "Mazhilis odobril prisoyedineniye respubliki k konventsii o zapreshchenii bakteriologicheskogo oruzhiya" (The Mazhilis Approved the Country's Joining the Convention on the Prohibition of Bacteriological Weapons), Kazakhstan Today News Agency, November 16, 2005; in Gazeta.kz, <http://www.gazeta.kz/>.
6 May 2006
On 6 May 2006,
the United States and Kazakhstan signed an amendment to the Agreement between
the Department of Defense of the United States of America and the Ministry of
Energy and Mineral Resources of the Republic of Kazakhstan Concerning the
Elimination of Infrastructure for Weapons of Mass Destruction.
— "Cheney visit to Kazakhstan concluded," 6 May 2006, Kazakhstan Today News Agency; in Gazeta.kz: <http://eng.gazeta.kz/art.asp?aid=75019>.
19 August 2006
At a 19 August 2006 meeting in Astana with US Senator
Richard Lugar (R-IN), Kazakhstani officials indicated that the country planned
to expand its biological weapon nonproliferation measures. Specifically, the
country intends to create a disease surveillance system by constructing and
modernizgin diagnostic laboratories, improving the physical protection at
biological facilities, and expanding joint research between Kazakhstani and US
scientists.
— "Senior US Senator, Kazakh Security Chiefs Discuss Non-Proliferation Cooperation," BBC Monitoring International Reports, 19 August 2006; Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe, http://www.lexis.nexis.com.
7 May 2007
On 17 April, Kazakhstan's government ratified the Convention on the
prohibition of the development, production and stockpiling of bacteriological
and toxin weapons and on their destruction. President Nursultan Nazarbayev
signed the legislation on 7 May 2007. Kazakhstan joining the Convention will
mark yet another step toward strengthening its role as an advocate for the
nonproliferation of WMD.
— "Kazakhstan's Parliment Ratifies Bioweapons Convention" Kazakhstan News Bulletin, Vol. 7 No. 16; 20 April 2007.
Key Sources: Gulbarshyn Bozheyeva, Yerlan Kunakbayev, and Dastan Yeleukenov, "Former Soviet Biological Weapons Facilities in Kazakhstan: Past, Present and Future," Occasional Paper, No. 1, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, June 1999; Jonathan B. Tucker and Raymond A. Zilinskas, "The 1971 Smallpox Epidemic in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, and the Soviet Biological Warfare Program," Occasional Paper No. 9, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, June 2002; Anthony Rimmington, "The Biopharmaceutical Industry in Kazakhstan: Opportunities for UK Companies," Report of the DTI OSTEMS 'Scout' Mission to Kazakhstan, University of Birmingham, July 1995; Jonathan B. Tucker's speech during the briefing on "Biological Decontamination of Vozrozhdeniye Island: The U.S.-Uzbek Agreement," Cooperative Threat Reduction Annual Report to Congress Fiscal Year 2008, December 31, 2006, Defense Threat Reduction Agency, <http://www.dtra.mil >.
