Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- In a Wednesday speech in Switzerland, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged member nations of the Biological Weapons Convention to increase transparency in the life sciences sector and explore revisions in voluntary reporting about biological materials (see GSN, Dec. 6).

Along with improved detection and response capabilities for disease outbreaks, an expansion in the amount and quality of information that nations divulge could help strengthen the 1975 agreement, she said in the first address by a U.S. secretary of State to a BWC five-year review conference.

The Biological Weapons Convention bans the development, acquisition or stockpiling of biological agents or toxins that lack a peaceful justification, as well as associated delivery systems. It includes no formal verification regime but instead relies on voluntary measures -- such as the optional issuance of public reports by member nations -- to build world confidence that prohibited activities are not taking place.

The United States is one of 165 nations that have ratified the pact, which also includes 12 signatory states.

Clinton focused her remarks at the seventh BWC review conference on what she sees as a growing risk that terrorists, rather than nation states, might carry out a major disease attack.

"A crude, but effective, terrorist weapon can be made by using a small sample of any number of widely available pathogens, inexpensive equipment, and college-level chemistry and biology," she said in her address at the Palais des Nations in Geneva. "Less than a year ago, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula made a call to arms for -- and I quote -- 'brothers with degrees in microbiology or chemistry to develop a weapon of mass destruction.'"

Thomas Countryman, the assistant secretary of State for international security and nonproliferation, last week laid out three major areas of focus for the U.S. delegation at the 14-day review conference (see GSN, Dec. 2). Clinton offered a bit of further detail regarding each initiative.

"First, we need to bolster international confidence that all countries are living up to our obligations under the convention," she said, reaffirming the U.S. position that the biological sector is too large and complex to make a formal verification regime feasible.

Rather, Clinton said, member nations should "revise the convention's annual reporting systems to ensure that each party is answering the right questions, such as what we are each all doing to guard against the misuse of biological materials."

In addition, participating governments should be willing to make more information publicly available and open their facilities to outsiders, she said.

"We will underscore that commitment by inviting a few state parties to the convention to tour a U.S. biodefense facility next year," Clinton said. The secretary of State did not specify the site, but there has been some prior discussion about allowing such visits at Fort Detrick, Md., where the U.S. Army maintains its Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases.

Clinton noted that the United States had recently hosted members of a U.N. nonproliferation panel to discuss how Washington is implementing a Security Council resolution aimed at curbing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (see GSN, Sept. 16).

A number of critics have rapped Washington for failing to be more proactive in demonstrating transparency in the biological field, insisting the U.S. government could serve as a model in opening its disease research facilities and data more fully to international agencies and BWC partners. A senior State Department official on Tuesday acknowledged that some developing nations have called for a mandatory reporting system.

"Some states, particularly in the nonaligned movement, believe there should be a more centralized, regularized mechanism to require and enforce this kind of [information] exchange," the official, speaking on condition of not being named, said at a Geneva press conference.

A second area of focus at the conference, Clinton said in her Wednesday speech, should be to "strengthen each country's ability to detect and respond to outbreaks and improve international coordination." She called for states parties to "redouble our efforts" to build "core capacities" in disease surveillance and treatment by a June 2012 goal, set five years ago by 194 nations at the World Health Organization.

Third, Clinton said, would be to carry out a "thoughtful international dialogue about the ways to maximize the benefits of scientific research and minimize the risks."

As an example, she cited how the emerging gene synthesis field has made genetic material more widely available, which has been a boon to research. The procedure involves creating genes in a laboratory setting.

"But it could also potentially be used to assemble the components of a deadly organism," Clinton warned. "So how do we balance the need for scientific freedom and innovation with the necessity of guarding against such risks?"

The senior State Department official at Tuesday's news briefing said differences remain among BWC member nations over whether the agreement should include a mandatory verification regime. However, the figure said it was unlikely that either that disagreement or schisms over the transparency issue would "prevent us from having a successful conclusion" at the review conference.

Typically the five-year BWC conferences conclude with a final statement, issued by consensus among the parties, setting out an agenda for biological security efforts for the coming five years.

A second senior official at the press conference noted that Iran in April signaled that it might press for the development of a BWC verification regime as the Geneva meetings unfold.