Western delegations in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) called Russia's warnings about Kiev possibly using chemical weapons in Ukraine disinformation, and insisted that only Moscow will be held responsible for any such incident, Russian permanent representative to the organization Alexander Shulgin told Sputnik on Thursday
PARIS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th April, 2022) Western delegations in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) called Russia's warnings about Kiev possibly using chemical weapons in Ukraine disinformation, and insisted that only Moscow will be held responsible for any such incident, Russian permanent representative to the organization Alexander Shulgin told Sputnik on Thursday.
"Wise delegations fully share our concerns about the threat of the use of toxic chemicals in Ukraine. Western countries, on the other hand, took the most two-faced position possible. At the March session of the executive council they directly stated that Russia's warnings are nothing more than disinformation, and only our country will be held responsible for any incident," Shulgin said.
At the same time, the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) does not allow exclusion of a country from the OPCW, Shulgin said, commenting on Russia's possible exclusion from the organization because of Ukraine.
"The CWC does not provide for a mechanism for expelling a state party from the OPCW. However, the Euro-Atlantic allies are doing harmful work to turn the organization, which is purely technical in nature, into an instrument of pressure on unwanted countries," Shulgin added.
On February 24, Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine after the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk appealed for help in defending themselves against Ukrainian forces. On Tuesday, the OPCW said that both Russia and Ukraine had alerted it to threats of the use of toxins as weapons in the conflict. Their letters were shared with all 193 member states.
