Iran censures U.S., Britain for violating Chemical Weapons Convention

TEHRAN, July 12 (MNA) – Iran’s representative to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) criticized the United States and Britain for not complying with the Chemical Weapons Convention during the occupation of Iraq. Kazem Gharibabadi, who is also Iran’s ambassador to the Netherlands, made the remarks during the 69th Session of the Executive Council of the OPCW, which is being held in The Hague from July 10 to 13. He said that the U.S. and Britain should be held accountable for the destruction of Iraq’s chemical weapons, which was done without the supervision of the OPCW, during the occupation of Iraq after the 2003 invasion of the country by the U.S. and its allies, which overthrew Saddam Hussein’s Baathist regime. He asked the OPCW Technical Secretariat to provide a transparent explanation in this regard. The Iranian ambassador also called on the countries that possess chemical weapons, particularly the U.S., to meet their international commitments with regard to the total eradication of chemical weapons. April 29, 2012 had been set as the final deadline for the total eradication of all chemical weapons, but the U.S., which is the country that has the largest stockpiles of chemical weapons, failed to meet the 2012 deadline and set 2021 as its target date. Elsewhere in his remarks, Gharibabadi urged the secretariat of the OPCW to make every effort to implement Iran’s proposal calling for the establishment of the International Support Network for the Victims of Chemical Weapons, which was approved by the member states in December 2011.