Key talks a historic first step in fight against chemical weapons

THE HAGUE: Global powers will seek next week to take a historic step in the fight against chemical weapons by giving the world’s toxic arms watchdog new power to identify those behind such attacks.

Widely shunned as taboo since silently culling the battlefields of World War I, recent use of poison gases in the Iraq and Syria conflicts – as well as rare nerve agent attacks in Kuala Lumpur and the sleepy English town of Salisbury – have triggered international alarm.

Despite widespread revulsion at shocking images of children fight- ing for breath, the international community has so far failed to agree on any punitive action against those believed responsible, amid a bitter standoff between Russia and Western nations in United Nations.

Now in the wake of the nerve agent attack on former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury – the first such attack in decades on European soil – Britain is leading calls to give the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) broader powers.

Backed by 11 allies, London has called a rare special session of the OPCW’s policy-making Conference of State Parties in The Hague at which it will seek to give the body a mandate to say who is to blame for any chemical weapons attacks.

A draft British proposal will go to the meeting, which opens tomorrow, proposing the OPCW “begins attributing responsibility for chemical weapons attacks in Syria,” British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said in a tweet.

“With proven technical expertise on chemical weapons the OPCW is the right body to study who is behind an attack,” he added.

Some 96% of the world’s declared toxic arms stockpile has been eliminated by the Nobel Peace Prizewinning organisation, with the rest still held by the US due to be destroyed by 2023.

But new evolving scenarios, including the use of mustard gas by the Islamic State group, are triggering fears.

“This is not the chemical weapons problem we faced during the Cold War for example,” said French diplomat Nicolas Roche to Washington think-tank the Centre for Strate- gic and International Studies (CSIS).

“This is really about almost daily use of those weapons on a theatre of operations for tactical and military gain.”

Amid sharp political differences over the war in Syria and divisions between Russia and the West, the talks in the Hague could see a tense showdown tomorrow.

Delegates from possibly all 193 OPCW member nations will huddle behind closed doors to vote on the British-led draft, which will need a two-thirds majority of those voting to pass. — AFP