THE HAGUE, December 1. /TASS/. Member nations of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have failed to agree on a final document at the Fourth Review Conference that was held in The Hague on November 21-30, Russia’s Permanent Representative to OPCW Alexander Shulgin told TASS on Friday.
"A group pf Western countries has done itheir utmost to not agree on the final document of the Review Conference," he said. "As a matter of fact, they ‘killed’ the draft by suggesting, at the very last moment, wordings that are absolutely unacceptable for a big number of states, including us, due to principled considerations."
"Russia, along with China, Iran, Syria and its CSTO [Collective Security Treaty Organization] partners firmly repelled all the attacks of our opponents," Shulgin stressed. "We cited concrete examples to demonstrate how selective the Americans are in the provisions of the Chemical Weapons Convention, that they violate its norms pretty often. Notably, nowadays they are the only country which has considerable chemical arsenals that have not yet been destroyed. Moreover, they are holding back on it until 2023, despite the fact that they have necessary financial, technological and human resources."
"We stressed that the United States continues efforts to factionalize the organization," he said. "They care little both about two-way diplomacy and opinion of other players. They want the OPCW to be a manageable instrument to resolve the tasks they want. The Americans have turned into repeated violators of international law, substituting it with the rules they invent."
"The conference has demonstrated that the organization, which used to be one of the most successful international forums in the area of disarmament and nonproliferation and which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, is now in a profound crisis and the responsibility for it rests on those who, being guided by politically motivated considerations, continue to whip up tensions within the OPCW," he said. "Upon the Russian delegation's initiative, a group of 27 member states adopted a joint statement expressing serious concern about the organization's future and calling for restoring the spirit of cooperation and consensus in its framework."
"Only following this path, we can bring the OPCW’s work back to a constructive course and begin to act in the interests of the universalization of this major international treaty serving the task of resolution of pressing problems of today, including rebuffing chemical terrorism," he underscored.
"Only by taking this path, we can bring OPCW's work back on the constructive course and start acting in the interests of universalizing this important internaitonal agreement in the sphere of solving current problems, including fighting against chemical terrorism," Shulgin stressed.