How the world has changed. Iraq s unchecked use of prohibited weapons of mass destruction against Iran in the 1980s emboldened nations and terrorist organizations who saw lethal rewards and little risk in the proliferation and use of chemical and biological arms. The demise of the Soviet Union revealed a bio-weapons program, in direct violation of the BWC, on an almost unimaginable scale. According to yesterday s Washington Post , surplus Soviet biological weapons, technology and expertise may yet be made available to the highest bidder despite U.S. threat reduction efforts. The draft protocol under discussion in Geneva raises, but does not yet answer, fundamental questions about curbing the spread of biological weapons.
Recent history offers only partial answers.
Experience to date under the Chemical Weapons Convention provides some comfort that procedural and substantive safeguards can work to protect the rights, and the intellectual property, of the inspected. But it remains uncertain whether the same safeguards will work in a very different setting, in which a single microscopic organism contains the blueprint for a product or process worth hundreds of millions of dollars. As the Subcommittee begins our consideration of these important issues today, we are fortunate to be joined by the lead U.S. negotiator on the BWC protocol, Ambassador Donald Mahley, and others who bring a great deal of experience and expertise to this discussion. We look forward to their testimony. In working with the administration on these issues, PhRMA has not been shy about expressing a position in favor of a more workable, cost-effective process to control biological weapons.