25 July 2001

U.S. Sees "Significant Risks" in Biological Weapons Protocol

The United States declined to support the proposed Biological Weapons Protocol because it added "nothing new to our verification capabilities" and contained "significant risks to U.S. national interests," a State Department official says.

Deputy Spokesman Phil Reeker told reporters at the State Department briefing July 25 that the United States fully supports the Biological Weapons Convention and will "continue to work very closely" with other states parties to discuss how the pact can be strengthened.

Following is the excerpt from the briefing dealing with biological weapons:

(begin excerpt)

Q: Could you explain why the United States does not want to sign this (biological weapons) protocol as it stands?

Mr. Reeker: Well, I think Ambassador[(Donald] Mahley [the U.S. special negotiator on chemical and biological arms control issues] has also done that quite well....We fully support the bioweapons convention. We have been a party to that since its inception, looking at nearly 30 years. We think it's an important international agreement to which we are a valuable part and will remain so.

The protocol which was proposed adds nothing new to our verification capabilities, and it was the unanimous in the United States government that there were significant risks to U.S. national interests, and that's why we could not support that protocol. Implementation of such a protocol would have caused problems, I think, for our biological weapons defense programs, would have risked intellectual property problems for our pharmaceutical and biotech industries, and risked the loss of integrity and utility to our very rigorous multilateral export control regimes. And so we believe that not having this protocol is better than having one.

We'll continue to work very closely with the other members, signatories and parties to the bioweapons convention, to discuss how we can take steps to strengthen that convention and work on issues like verification, and we'll continue moving ahead in that direction....

Q: I was wondering, has there been any response or backlash from the U.S. opposition to the convention? And secondly, is the administration at all concerned about a perception of unilateralism or isolationism from the series of multilateral agreements that --

Mr. Reeker: In terms of the first part of your question, I'm not aware of a particular response on that. I don't think it was a surprise to anybody. I think our views were well-known and had been shared and we'd been discussing our concerns about the direction that this draft agreement, this draft protocol was going. So it shouldn't have really been a surprise to anyone.

I think a number of our allies, in fact, have understood quite clearly our concerns about this, and we felt that we needed to take a leadership position to protect not only our own interests but to perhaps curb the momentum in terms of the direction that this protocol was heading and not accomplishing what the ad hoc group had truly set out to do in the terms of strengthening the bioweapons convention.

In terms of the suggestion of unilateralism, I think just on the face of it, it can be dismissed. Here we are working multilaterally in an ad hoc group, discussing with our friends and allies and others issues like the bioweapons convention. It's become a convenient catchphrase in much of the media and certainly in other parts of the world to suggest there is some American unilateralism.

I reject that completely, because we work bilaterally with individual countries and on our relations with them and we work very much multilaterally through the United Nations and its network of organizations, conventions and programs. We're a very active player around the globe.

The president of the United States has just returned after being in Genoa, where he participated with the Group of Eight nations at their annual summit meeting, sitting at the table with the other leading economies of the world.

The United States accounts for a quarter of the world's economy, and we've talked many times about how integrated the world economy is now, about how our economy, our investments, our trade are very dependent upon the same factors in other parts of the world.

So to suggest that there's some sort of unilateralist tendency here I think is just wrong. And I think people need to step back and look at the steps we've taken, look at how we've engaged around the world in multilateral fora and in our bilateral relations with so many countries. Just take a look at the list of countries that Secretary Powell has met with, the representatives of those countries that he's met with here in Washington, that he's met with on the road. He's currently, as we just discussed, in Asia, where he's participating at the ASEAN Regional Forum; not some unilateral process, but a regional forum, where we can discuss with friends and allies and others on the world scene issues of the day, things that are important to us.

So we will continue to participate multilaterally, continue to show leadership around the world, but also, most importantly, to represent American interests. And because we are showing leadership, we are not going to stand back and go along with things that are not in our interest or do not accomplish the goals which they set out to reach.

So I think it's very important to look broadly at where we're going. As we've said on other subjects, international relations is not some sort of zero-sum game; it is the practice of diplomacy. And the Bush administration, and certainly Secretary of State Powell, are practicing a rigorous diplomacy all around the world to defend our interests, to promote trade and good relations, to better the world. And that's what we will continue to do in the future.

(end excerpt)