Syria: Disarmament in animated suspense
Syria has now missed about every single deadline since it was unable to move the Priority 1 chemicals out of the country by the end of last year. These even include renegotiated time frames and the self-imposed final date of 27 April. One more fixed date is pending: 30 June, by which time all precursor chemicals should have been neutralised. It would now seem that the world will sigh with relief if everything is aboard the Danish and Norwegian freighters by the end of next month. US officials envisage 60 working days to neutralise the volume of precursor chemicals and …
NPT Article VI and BTWC Article IX
[This contribution appeared orginally in Arms Control Law, and was in reply to a discussion on the blog. Links to the original arguments are included. – Jean Pascal] This discussion between Marco [Roscini] and Dan [Joyner] on Article VI of the NPT and customary law is instructive. In this particular case, Marco’s application of the notion to a single article rather than the totality of the treaty puzzles me. I would tend to agree with Dan’s counterpoint. However, Dan then refers to the CWC in its entirety to draw an analogy. In my mind a bit problematic for two reasons: …
On the alleged customary nature of Article VI of the NPT – A Rejoinder to Joyner and Zanders
By Marco Roscini, 5 June 2014 [Marco Roscini, Reader in International Law at the University of Westminster, wrote this rejoinder on Arms Control Law. It is reproduced here with permission, as it forms part of a broader discussion about useful insights for nuclear disarmament to be derived from chemical and biological weapon disarmament. – Jean Pascal] Both Dan and Jean-Pascal offer excellent counterarguments in their replies to my blog post on the customary nature of Article VI, and I thank them for this. After thinking carefully about their comments, I would like to offer some further thoughts. 1) I think that …
OPCW announces final CW shipment out of Syria
Announcement to media on last consignment of chemicals leaving Syria Monday, 23 June 2014 Statement by Ahmet Üzümcü, Director-General OPCW Just under 9 months ago in October, I addressed you members of the press – in this same place, here in The Hague – to announce the deployment of the first OPCW inspectors to Syria to begin an historic and unprecedented mission. The mission was to destroy the chemical weapons programme of the Syrian Arab Republic. A major landmark in this mission has been reached today. The last of the remaining chemicals identified for removal from Syria were loaded this …
Gradually making sense of Syria’s CW declarations
Since my last update on the elimination of Syria’s chemical weapon (CW) capacities in May, all precursor chemicals have finally left the country. Some have been shipped to facilities in Finland and the USA, where they are in the process of being destroyed. The United Kingdom meanwhile completed the destruction of 190 tonnes of chemicals at an incinerator in Ellesmere Port. As of 7 August, 74.2% of Syria’s entire stockpile of chemical warfare agent precursors have been destroyed. Other chemicals are meanwhile being neutralised on board of the US vessel Cape Ray in the Mediterranean, and the resulting reaction mass …
The banalisation of tear gas
I am not the only person who is concerned by the banalisation of tear gas as a riot control agent. Over the past few years, the intensity with which such agents have been used has increased markedly, to the point that whole sections of cities now routinely become saturated with the toxic chemicals. In particular Michael Crowley of Bradford University’s Non-Lethal Weapons Project has published studies on the fast technological development and growing global markets of riot control agents and their delivery systems: one in collaboration with the Omega Research Foundation, and one, co-authored with Dana Perkins, then expert of …
Threat posed by Islamic State’s capture of Iraq’s Muthanna CW site
In a letter dated 7 July 2014 Iraqi Ambassador to the United Nations Mohamed Ali Alhakim notified UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon that ‘armed terrorist groups’ had entered the Muthanna complex on 11 June. The next morning a project manager observed them looting of some equipment via the camera surveillance system before the ‘terrorists’ disabled it. The document, as cited by the Associated Press, explicitly referred to the capture of bunkers 13 and 41, two locations still holding chemical weapons (CW) so severely damaged during the 1991 war to liberate Kuwait that until today they could not be disposed of in …
New naval anti-piracy tactics – pepper spray and "domestic" riot control
Yesterday the Smithsonian “Smartnews” site featured the article Robot Ships And Pepper Spray—the Latest in Pirate-Fighting Tech. According to the piece, UK researchers are actively looking into mobilising capsaicin – the active ingredient in pepper spray – to fend off pirate attacks at sea: […] The age of naval battles between huge ships on the high seas seems to have passed into distant memory. Instead, some of the most devastating attacks on giant vessels in recent years have been executed by boats small enough to get through the larger ships’ defenses. But now, governments around the world are working on technology designed …
Üzümcü: "After Syria I do not see any country able to use chemical weapons anymore"
The last day of October, a sunny Friday in The Hague, I met with Ambassador Ahmet Üzümcü to reflect on the previous year and a half, during which the civil war in Syria suddenly thrust the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into the spotlight. In March 2013 United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon requested technical assistance from the OPCW to investigate alleged chemical weapon (CW) use in the war-torn country. Six months later, after a serious incident in which sarin nerve agent killed and poisoned many hundreds of people in the Ghouta district of Damascus, Syria unexpectedly joined …
Engaging Israel on CWC Ratification – Part 1: Outsider Perspectives
The Israeli Disarmament Movement together with the Chemical Weapons Convention Coalition (CWCC) and Green Cross convened two days of roundtable discussions on Chemical Weapons, Israel and the Middle East in Tel Aviv. The third day, 12 November, a briefing was held in the Knesset. In a region where (existential) security and the nuclear weapons stand central to any debate on arms control strategies, the exclusive focus on chemical weapons (CW) was a rare occurrence. The meeting goals were twofold: promote ratification of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) by Israel and to have Israel take a more positive stance in the …