THE HAGUE, October 14. /TASS/. The Technical Secretariat of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) tried to challenge the status of a Russian chemical laboratory, Russia’s Ambassador to the Netherlands and Permanent Representative to the organization Vladimir Tarabrin said after last week’s session of the OPCW Executive Council.

According to the Russian diplomat, the Russian side presented evidence of the use of chemical weapons by the Kiev regime that was certified by the laboratory of the Russian defense ministry’s 27th research center. The OPCW Technical Secretariat "tried to question its status, saying that it had not been authorized by the OPCW to do" what it did, he noted.

Russia, in turned, insisted that the laboratory was acting in a national capacity, but not on the basis of the Technical Secretariat’s mandate. "But this in no way changes its status as an OPCW designated laboratory," he stressed.

In his words, these attempts to disavow Russia’s documents and distract attention from them lead to an opposite effect. "This clumsy demarche attracted even bigger interest and even those delegations that would have never opted to study them took interest in them," he added.

According to the Russian diplomat, the Technical Secretariat’s nervous reaction is quite exemplary. "Of course, this is no surprise because we know that, regrettably, the influence of Western employees is very strong in the Technical Secretariat," he said. "Nevertheless, we hope that our documents will be taken seriously."