Generally, international law is believed to have institutionalised norms regulating interstate behaviour. Although international law regulates states’ behaviour, it remains an instrument of world politics– serving state interests of those capable of manipulating it, yet simultaneously sustaining a semblance of universal legality. Sadly, the nuclear law imbibed in international conventions or treaties is being politically instrumented by the powerful states in order to fulfil their national interests. Any use of chemical weapons, under any circumstances, is a clear breach of international law and contrary to the Chemical Weapons Convention. Yet arguably, the future of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) remains under fire since there are mounting concerns that some states could still use chemical agents in future military conflicts.
Last week, Director (Disarmament) at the Pakistan Foreign Office Ali Sattar, while speaking at a webinar hosted by the Centre for International Strategic Studies on ‘Chemical Weapons Convention: Challenges, Approaches and Implementation’, said “Politicisation of Chemical Weapons Convention would undermine the credibility of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapon” – the implementing body of the Convention. Pakistan never supports selective compliance with nuclear law.
The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) is a multilateral treaty that bans chemical weapons and requires their destruction within a specified period of time. The treaty is of unlimited duration and is far more comprehensive than the 1925 Geneva Protocol, which outlaws the use but not the possession of chemical weapons. CWC negotiations started in 1980 in the UN Conference on Disarmament. The convention opened for signature on January 13, 1993, and entered into force on April 29, 1997. The Convention requires state-parties to destroy: all chemical weapons under their jurisdiction or control; all chemical weapons production facilities under their jurisdiction or control; chemical weapons abandoned on other states’ territories; and old chemical weapons.
Of the 188 states that are party to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) — seven have declared chemical weapons stockpiles, including the US and Iraq. However, Russia tops the list of worst offenders
The use of chemical weapons is grossly illegal in international armed conflicts in a series of treaties, including the Hague Declaration concerning Asphyxiating Gases, the Geneva Gas Protocol, the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Statute of the International Criminal Court. Present, only 13 States are not party to either the Geneva Gas Protocol or the Chemical Weapons Convention. Of these, at least three have made statements to the effect that the use of chemical weapons is unlawful, or have indicated that they do not possess or use them or that they are committed to their elimination. The prohibition is also contained in a number of other instruments.
Moreover, numerous military manuals restate the prohibition of the use of chemical weapons. This prohibition is also contained in the legislation of many States. There are numerous statements and other practice by States from all parts of the world to the effect that the use of chemical weapons is prohibited under customary international law. There is also national case-law to the effect that the use of chemical weapons is prohibited under customary international law Conversely, the chemical weapons have been used during the Cold War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Afghan war, the Bosnian war, the Iraq–Iran conflict, the Gulf War, the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and in the ongoing war in Syria,
Although more than 60 percent of the world’s declared chemical weapons stockpiles have been successfully eliminated over the past two decades in five of the seven declared chemical weapons possessor states, almost 30,000 metric tons still await destruction, and several suspected possessor states remain outside the CWC regime. Meanwhile, terrorist organisations have reiterated their intention to obtain weapons of mass destruction—nuclear, chemical, and biological—raising the stakes over the past decade to secure and eliminate chemical weapons stockpiles as quickly as possible and strengthen the CWC nonproliferation and inspection regime.
Of the 188 states-parties to the convention today, seven have declared chemical weapons stockpiles: Albania, India, Iraq, Libya, Russia, South Korea, and the United States. Moscow declared the largest stockpile with 40,000 metric tons at seven arsenals in six regions—oblasts and republics—of Russia. Washington declared 28,577 metric tons at nine stockpiles in eight states and on Johnston Atoll west of Hawaii. Tripoli and Trina and declared the smallest stockpiles, 16 and 23 metric tons, respectively. New Delhi and Seoul declared stockpiles in the 2,000-metric-ton range, maintaining a high degree of secrecy around the size, location, and composition of their weapons. Baghdad, which joined the CWC in 2009, has declared two large bunkers with chemical weapons debris and related equipment.
Damascus acceded to the Chemical Weapons Convention in September 2013. In June 2014, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) announced that it had shipped Syria’s declared chemical weapons out of the country for destruction, though it continued attempting to verify the accuracy and completeness of the Syrian declaration. After the chemical attacks Ghouta in Syria in 2017 the United Nations Security Council demanded that the Syrian government destroy its chemical stockpiles, weapons, and production capacity.
“The reemergence of Assad’s offensive chemical weapons program, that would be significant,” said Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Arms Control Association. “It’s one thing to have barrel bombs dropped from helicopters. It’s another thing entirely to have sarin available for deploying on ballistic missiles that can hit other countries in the region. Those are two very different threats.”
Needless to say, chemical weapons are uniquely terrifying weapons of mass destruction. Exposure to sarin gas, a colourless, odourless nerve agent used repeatedly in Syria, leads to muscle twitches, unconsciousness, paralysis of respiratory organs and eventually a horrifying, death through asphyxiation. Since 1997, The Hague based OPCW has been engaged in its endeavour for the permanent and verifiable elimination of chemical weapons. But still, some gaps do exist in its verifiable methodology– depicting organisational disarray. For the OPCW to remain relevant, it must ensure that its verification regime adjusts to this dynamic environment, deterring any re-emergence of chemical weapons by state and non-state actors.
Nonetheless, it must be no surprise that well before either the Biological Weapons Convention( BWC ,1975) or the C Chemical Weapons Convention( CWC,1997) were agreed, there was already a norm in international law against the use of biological and chemical weapons. These particular treaty regimes were negotiated to ensure (without falling prey to the utilitarian doctrine of implied powers) that such weapons would not be used in warfare. The gravity of politicising the CWC renders the realisation that the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) must pivot from adopting a traditional approach to demonstrating a comprehensive compliance strategy for saving humanity from the appalling dangers of these weapons.
The writer is an independent ‘IR’ researcher and international law analyst based in Pakistan