MOSCOW, November 24. /TASS/. The proposal put forward by Russia to add some 200 chemicals from the Novichok group to checklists of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) has reduced the relevance of international discussions on their use, a senior Russian diplomat said on Thursday.

Addressing a news conference ahead of the Ninth BWC Review Conference, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said, "The importance of the topic on the agenda of high-level officials at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has somewhat decreased of late, because, among other reasons, a decision was made in 2019 at our initiative to include some 200 chemicals the West classifies as belonging to the so-called Novichok group in BWC checklists."

According to Ryabkov, the OPCW has been looking into the use of Novichok since 2018, and the nerve agent "was involved in the old boring insinuations by the so-called Euro-Atlantic allies led by the United States in relation to the notorious case of Srkipals and similarly provocative allegations that Alexey Navalny was poisoned." Meanwhile, he said, Russia is well aware of "numerous instances of research and development on this type of toxin at military labs in a number of countries, including Great Britain’s Porton Down, Edgewood in the US and similar military research centers and institutes in France, Germany and Sweden".