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Showing posts with label Ukraine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ukraine. Show all posts

Monday, April 18, 2022

Unmasking the superpower America, the 'Dark Lord' set on destroying international order

 

 Voldemort' of global order: America is the 'Dark Lord' set on destroying international order

Voldemort: The Dark Lord

 

 Editor's Note:

Since the start of the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the international community has grown increasingly aware of the role the US and NATO behind the crisis.

From imposing sanctions on "disobedient countries," to coercing other nations to pick sides, lip service on the Ukraine refugee issue, to a questionable overseas human rights record… the US has acted like a "Cold War schemer," or a "vampire" who creates "enemies" and makes its fortunes from pyres of war.

The Global Times is publishing a series of stories and cartoons to demonstrate how the US, abusing its superpower status, has been creating trouble in the world one crisis after another. This is the final installment.

1 Ukraine crisis instigator: US-led NATO reneges on 'Not one inch eastward' promise to compress Russia's space to the extreme
2 Instability brewer: Behind every war and turmoil in the world is shadow of the Star-Spangled Banner
3 'Vampires' in the war: US warmongers feeding on the bloody turbulence in other countries
4 Cold War schemer: Reminiscing in its past 'victory,' US brings color revolutions to 21st century to maintain its hegemony
5 The poison disseminator: How US spread biological 'poison', ethnic division and ideological antagonism around the world
6 Human rights destroyer: US causes humanitarian disasters around globe, killing innocent civilians and creating millions of refugees
7 'Voldemort' of global order: America is the 'Dark Lord' set on destroying international order

A woman walks past the landmark graffiti on the walls of the former US embassy in Tehran, Iran.  Photo: AFPA woman walks past the landmark graffiti on the walls of the former US embassy in Tehran, Iran. Photo: AFP

"Just in one year, our sanctions are likely to wipe out the last 15 years of Russia's economic gains" and make Russia "an outcast on the international stage." These remarks by US President Joe Biden after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian military conflict are frightening. The US could implement such a "strangulation" plan economically and politically to a superpower like Russia,, not to mention other countries that are not as powerful.

Fanning the flames to create turmoil, using economic and financial hegemony to sanction opponents, and forming cliques to create political isolation - the US is using its hegemony to undermine the international order.

In fact, the US government's approach is quite similar to Voldemort's - they both believe in power, recruit followers, use violence, and repeatedly want to kill competitors in order to maintain supremacy.

'Paralyzing' sanctions

After the Russia-Ukraine conflict broke out, the US did not persuade Moscow and Kiev to negotiate and promote peace, but instead continued to provide military assistance to Ukraine in an attempt to prolong the conflict and to bring down Russia.

On April 13, Biden announced that he would provide Ukraine with an additional $800 million in military aid to help Kiev strengthen its defenses. Since the conflict, Washington's aid to Kiev has surpassed $2.4 billion.

In addition to supporting Ukraine ensnare Russia, the US has also imposed "paralyzing" sanctions on Moscow, involving economic, financial, technological and other fields. Kicking some Russian banks out of the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), canceling the "Most-Favored-Nation" for trade with Russia, depriving Russian citizens access to their overseas assets, restricting the sale of Russian vodka... the US sanctions against Russia are all-inclusive.

Unwilling to act alone, the US is also pulling together European countries, Australia, Japan, South Korea and many other allies to deal with Russia, trying to "turn the ruble into paper." With their joint "efforts," Russia has become the country that has suffered the most sanctions from the US in recent years. According to a report by Sputnik News Agency, data from a sanctions tracking platform shows that since 2014, Russia has been subject to 5,532 sanctions, surpassing Iran and Syria.

Meanwhile, since the conflict began, at least 300 multinational companies have withdrawn from Russia. JPMorgan Chase previously predicted that Russia's GDP will shrink by 12 percent due to Western sanctions. Some Russian experts have warned that living standards in Russians may drop to 1990s levels. Meanwhile, the World Bank predicts that Ukraine's GDP will plummet by about 45.1 percent this year.

The war brought disaster to both Russia and Ukraine, while the US benefited.

A heartless dependence on sanctions

The crazy sanctions against Russia are just the latest manifestation of the US sanction addiction. Over the past 20 years, the US has relied on the tool of sanctions almost to the point of insanity. The number of sanctioned targets on the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Asset Control sanctions list has grown from 912 in 2000 to 9,421 in October 2021, a net increase of 933 percent.

Iran, Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, and North Korea are all on the US sanctions list, the reasons given by the US government for punishing these countries include the so-called "anti-terrorism", "anti-corruption", and "protection of human rights, " but the real reasons are in fact closely related to the US' ideological differences and geopolitical interests. The sanctions have ultimately triggered huge humanitarian disasters in these countries, observers said.

On October 25, 2021 people held a demonstration near the US Embassy in Zimbabwe to protest against Western sanctions against Zimbabwe. Photo: Xinhua

On October 25, 2021 people held a demonstration near the US Embassy in Zimbabwe to protest against Western sanctions against Zimbabwe. Photo: Xinhua

John Mueller, professor of political science at the University of Rochester, has compared the threat of chemical and biological weapons to the massive death and destruction caused by US economic sanctions and found that "more people have been killed because of the sanctions than have been killed by all weapons of mass destruction in history."


Except for sovereign states, companies of all countries will be hunted down by the US as long as they affect the country's interest.  Germany's Siemens, Japan's Toshiba, France's Alstom. The US has set one trap after another for these competitors in the high-tech sector. They were all fined heavily by Washington, and their core businesses were severely affected. Some employees were even arrested by the US government on trumped up charges. Frederic Pierucci, former executive of Alstom, detailed in his book The American Trap about how the US, under the guise of anti-corruption, manage to dismantle many of Europe's biggest multinationals for more than a decade.

The US has always stressed the need to maintain the so-called "rules-based international order," but when it comes to international trade rules, the US applies them when it suits them and abandons when it doesn't. The WTO report shows that two-thirds of the organization's violations are caused by the US, making the country the biggest "non-compliant" nation of WTO ruling.

'Secret Cold War'

The so-called "rules-based order", a termed pushed by the US had gained currency after then US President George W. Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq without the approval of the United Nations (UN) Security Council, which "exemplified his general disregard for international restraints on American power," according to an article published on The New York Times (NYT) in June 2021.

Looking back at the wars in the Korean Peninsula, Vietnam, Iraq, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Syria - the US, under the banner of "upholding justice," "stopping aggression" and "humanitarian intervention," participated in almost all major wars and armed conflicts around the world since WWII to maintain its hegemony. That has led to untold humanitarian disaster to the invaded countries and regions, and plunged them into instability and economic recession.

Former US president Jimmy Carter, once referred to the US as "the most warlike nation in the history of the world." In order to impose its political system and values, the US willfully interferes in other countries' internal affairs. It also provokes the so-called "color revolutions" and incites unrest in the involved countries in addition to military invasions.

According to American scholar Lindsey A. O'Rourke's book Covert Regime Change: America's Secret Cold War, the US engaged in 64 covert attempts at regime change during the Cold War. After the 9/11 attacks, the US started to use "counter-terrorism" as an excuse to force regime change abroad. The war on "terror" spread to more than 40 percent of the world's countries since 2001, according to a special report by the Smithsonian Magazine. Another study conducted by Brown University showed that, the post-9/11 wars have led to over 929,000 deaths and over 38 million refugees and displaced persons.

US' economic bullying not only affects the economic livelihood of the sanctioned countries, but also causes serious damage to the global economic order and economic security. Western sanctions against Russia have also had a profound impact on the global energy, food and financial markets. According to the Financial Times, sanctions against Russia are the biggest blow to globalization, devouring not only the real wealth but also expectations of future global economic growth.

US and UK ambassadors to the United Nations vote on March 31, 1992 for sanctions against Libya.?Photo: AFPUS and UK ambassadors to the United Nations vote on March 31, 1992 for sanctions against Libya.?Photo: AFP

A 'rogue superpower'

As a principal architect and custodian of the international order after WWII, the US is the initiator, founder and participant of many existing international organizations and international treaties. However, if these rules affect US' interests, Washington is quick to push them to one side.

In January 2017, the US withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. In December 2018, the US announced its withdrawal from the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration. And in the following years, the US has withdrawn from the Iran Nuclear Deal, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, the Open Skies Treaty and other international agreements.

In terms of international organizations, the US has twice officially withdrawn from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization in October 2017 and again in January 2019. When the International Criminal Court "encroached" on US interests, Washington was quick to threaten sanctions in September 2020.

"In the early 21st century, if any power sought world domination, coercing others and flouting rules, it was the United States," commented a NYT opinion piece in October 2020. Noam Chomsky and other prominent US scholars also bluntly said that the US has become a "rogue superpower."

Experts point out that countries of the world are seeing ever more clearly the behavior of the US in undermining the international order. After the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, facing the extreme pressure from the US, Serbia refused to follow the West to impose sanctions on Russia. On April 9, Iran, which has suffered from decades of US sanctions, announced the inclusion of 24 Americans on its blacklist of sanctioned individuals for violations of human rights of the Iranian people.

Conclusion

In the Harry Potter series, Voldemort's arrogance and unchecked need for absolute power lead to his eventual demise. Unmasking the nature of US government as Voldemort, its face has now been revealed to readers piece by piece - the US is not only the Ukraine Crisis Instigator and Cold War Schemer, but also the  Instability Brewer, Poison Disseminator, "Vampires" in the war who spread plague and creates hatred, a Human Rights Destroyer who committed grave crimes against humanity, and the ""Voldemort" of Global Order. The world has suffered from the US for too long, and it is only a matter of time before the US' hegemonic behavior and destruction of the international order backfires.

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Saturday, April 9, 2022

Check on US biological labs worldwide

Photo/Agencies] 
https://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202203/10/WS622942dfa310cdd39bc8b92f.html

The mystery of 336 US bio-labs worldwide   

The ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict has led to some unexpected discoveries. Russian media outlets recently reported that the Pentagon had commissioned more than 30 biological laboratories in Ukraine, where large quantities of dangerous viruses were stored.

The United States supposedly depends on these laboratories to implement its biological warfare research. And these are only a handful, or less than 10 percent of the 336 biological laboratories the US reportedly controls in 30 countries around the world.

No wonder the US was desperately pushing for "origin-tracing" studies for the COVID-19 outbreak at Chinese laboratories. Maybe because they have laboratories spread around the world, they are aware of the high risks of viruses leaking and triggering pandemics. They assumed similar risks from Chinese laboratories, but that is stretching it too far.

It is the US that's ill, but it is forcing China to take the pill. And that's precisely why the US has failed to bring COVID-19 under control on its shores. Instead of acknowledging the problem it is busy blaming others.

It is now also clear why the US has, for four decades, tried to prevent the Biological Weapons Convention from establishing a checking mechanism. Of the 182 signatories to the convention, the US is the only one that pulled out of negotiations for such a mechanism in 2001. It is clear that by doing so the US wants to protect the secrets of its 336 biological labs worldwide.

Latest reports say that the US embassy in Ukraine hurriedly deleted information related to the biological labs there. But they cannot wash away the fact about the existence of such laboratories around the world. It is time the US published information about these biological laboratories, including what kind of viruses are stored there, what "research" is going on and what harm they pose to people in these countries and around the world. The world should demand answers.

The mystery of 336 US bio-labs worldwide 

US' dirty records of using, developing bio, chemical weapons. Graphic: Zhao Jun/GT

Besides Fort Detrick at home, US military has 336 biolabs in 30 countries including Ukraine

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The US has 336 labs in 30 countries under its control, including 26 in Ukraine alone. It should give a full account of its biological military activities at home and abroad and subject itself to multilateral verification.
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Personnel at work in the biosafety level-4 laboratory at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in 2002. [Photo/Agencies]

An envoy called on the international community to assess documents on US military biological activities, which were published by the Russian government, to alleviate the “great concern” of the international community.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has reminded us that as a crucial matter of international peace and security, biological security has no borders and involves the shared interests of humanity,” Dai Bing, China’s deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, said during the UN Security Council Arria Formula Meeting on biological security, hosted by Russia.

“Thus, any information on the biological military activity should trigger heightened concern and attention of the international community to avoid irreparable harm,” Dai said.

He stressed that “China welcomes the international community to assess the discovered documents within appropriate frameworks including the BWC (Biological Weapons Convention) and the UN, and hear the clarifications from the relevant country in a fair and impartial manner”.

He said the relevant country should “take a responsible approach and offer timely and comprehensive clarifications on its biological activities to remove the doubts of the international community”.

“Further enhancement of the transparency on its global biological activities is also needed,” he added.

China has suffered from biological weapons during World War II, Dai said, and hence “consistently stands for the complete prohibition and thorough destruction of all weapons of mass destruction, including biological and chemical weapons”.

Dai said China “firmly opposes the development, stockpiling or use of biological and chemical weapons by any country under any circumstances and urges countries that have not done so to destroy their chemical weapons stockpiles as soon as possible”.

“All States parties should comply with the objectives and principles of the BWC in good faith,” he said.

Sunday will mark the 50th anniversary of the opening for signature of the BWC, he noted.

“The current dynamics on biological security highlight the urgent need to relaunch negotiations on a verification protocol under the BWC and establish a professional, impartial and independent multilateral verification mechanism based on that,” Dai said. 

 Dai said such a mechanism is a necessary but "long-absent instrument to eliminate potential biological weapons threats and enhance the authority and effectiveness of the BWC, and its establishment must not be thwarted by any certain member state".— China Daily/ANN

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US shuns UN meeting on biological security to 'cover up guilt conscience'

 

Russia has called for a UN Security Council meeting to discuss purported US-backed biological weapons programs in Ukraine.Photo:VCG

 

When Russia, China and other countries expressed their concerns over US biological activities in countries including Ukraine at a UN Security Council meeting on Wednesday, the US did not show up, which in some Chinese experts' eyes, was out of the US' "guilty conscience" over the issue.

At the UN Security Council Arria Formula Meeting on Biological Security on Wednesday, Igor Kirillov, chief of the Radiation, Chemical and Biological Defense Forces of the Russian Armed Forces, said Washington is creating biological laboratories in different countries and connecting them to a unified system. In territories bordering Russia and China alone, about 60 facilities have been modernized since 2005 with funding from the US military, he said. Kirillov noted that the US has spent more than $5 billion on military biological programs since 2005.

The Ukrainian network of laboratories is designed to conduct research and monitor the biological situation consisting of 30 facilities in 14 populated locations, Kirillov said, noting especially valuable materials from Ukrainian biological laboratories were exported to the US in early February, and the rest should be destroyed, TASS reported.

Dai Bing, China's deputy permanent representative to the UN, said at the meeting that China firmly opposes the development, stockpiling or use of biological and chemical weapons by any country under any circumstances, and the Russian Federation has published a number of documents related to the biological military activities of the US, which has caused great concern from the international community.

China welcomes the international community to assess the discovered documents within appropriate frameworks including the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) and the UN, and hear the clarifications from the relevant country in a fair and impartial manner. The relevant country should take a responsible approach and offer timely and comprehensive clarifications on its biological activities to remove the doubts of the international community, Dai said.

According to the TASS report, diplomats from Brazil, Venezuela, Belarus and other countries also spoke at the meeting, but US and UK representatives did not show up.

"This is evidence of their real attitude to this problem--the fact that they have something to hide and do not want to answer the uncomfortable questions posed today," Russian First Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Dmitry Polyansky said, TASS reported.

Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and TV commentator, told the Global Times that the US did not attend the meeting out of "guilty conscience," and the US did not want to make public its biological activities but covered its hidden agenda with "commercial secrets."

The US kept setting up biological laboratories around rival countries with the goal of developing targeted viral weapons against those countries, Song said.

The US insists on developing weapons of mass destruction to seek hegemony, which is a gross violation of the BWC and an assault on human civilization, he said.

Wang Yiwei, director of the institute of international affairs at the Renmin University of China, told the Global Times that the US attacks voices from Russia as disinformation and attempts to use its resources to shut off Russia's voices, and amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the US believes that Russia was trying to use the biological lab issue to rewrite the story of its military operation in Ukraine.

No matter it's for stirring up a color revolution or conducting biological activities in Ukraine, the US' purpose is to create confrontations and division to slow down its decline, Wang said.

Facing growing concerns, the responses from Washington have made the international community more concerned. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said the US has "biological research facilities" in Ukraine. But the US Department of State said Russia's claims of US bio-weapons activities in Ukraine were "outright lies."

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that the US should share comprehensive information on bio-labs in Ukraine.

During this week's Preparatory Committee for the Ninth Review Conference of the BWC, the US cited "revisionist history" to describe the international community's criticism over its opposition to the establishment of a verification mechanism of the BWC, Zhao Lijian, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, said at Thursday's media briefing, noting that the US' remarks are "shocking."

He said what the US wants is to arbitrarily accuse others of violating the convention and demand verification with "the presumption of guilt", while refusing to accept any supervision and verification of its own compliance.

This lies at the heart of the US' sole opposition to a verification mechanism, Zhao said. 

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US’ exclusive opposition to the biological weapons verification regime an egregious act of seeking global hegemony

Military personnel stand guard outside the USAMRIID at Fort Detrick on September 26, 2002. Photo: AFP

Editor's Note:

The US has ignited a war between Russia and Ukraine for its own selfish interests, the flames of war have also unveiled a darker side of the US' secret biological experimentation activities around the world.. Although the US government has repeatedly claimed that it is not developing biological weapons, numerous facts show that this claim is hardly convincing.

Biological weapons have always been an extremely sensitive topic in the international military and political arena. However, the US first pushed for the conclusion of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) and then exclusively opposed the establishment of a multilateral verification mechanism for the convention for more than 20 years. Observers and experts reached by the Global Times noted that hidden behind this flip-flopping stance is the US' elaborate calculations of international and domestic realities, which is another nefarious attempt to seek global hegemony under its narrow view of security.

US says 'No' to BWC verification

As the world frowns at the three recognized weapons of mass destruction - nuclear weapons, chemical weapons and biological weapons, the US is happy to have so many of them.

It is well known that the US possesses nuclear weapons with the capacity to destroy the world multiple times. In the case of chemical weapons, "The US is the sole possessor state party of chemical weapons," said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian at a regular press conference on March 10. At the same time, the US is the only country that has so far opposed the establishment of a biological weapons verification mechanism.

As the cornerstone of international biological arms control, the BWC was opened for signature in 1972 and entered into force in 1975, with more than 180 states parties. It is the first international convention of the international community to ban an entire category of weapons of mass destruction, and together with the Geneva Protocol and UN Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004), constituting the basic arrangement of the international biological arms control system.

The lack of monitoring, verification and punishment for compliance by states parties to the convention has led to widespread international recognition of the need for a protocol that includes a verification mechanism. After years of negotiations, the draft Biological Weapons Convention Compliance Protocol, which integrates the positions of all parties, was formed.

However, in 2001, the states parties to the Convention suddenly discovered that years of effort had been in vain as "a new US administration with a demonstrated antipathy to arms treaties is about to block the final step," said Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, co-founder of American Scientists Working Group on Biological and Chemical Weapons.

At that time, the administration of then US president George W. Bush alleged that the US rejected the draft verification protocol because it had numerous problems and serious errors. Subsequently, at successive review meetings, the US clearly expressed its opposition to restarting the relevant negotiations.

The US was one of the countries that initially pushed for the BWC. Influenced by international and domestic political, scientific and cultural factors, US biological weapons policy is a strategic approach based on precise calculation and a fragile balance based on realism, said Wang Xiaoli, biological expert of the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association.

With the development of the times, especially the changes in biotechnology, this strategic orientation and fragile balance can easily collapse, Wang told the Global Times.

Russia’s Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya shows pictures during the UN Security Council meeting discussing US biological warfare labs in Ukraine, on March 11, 2022. Photo: IC

Russia’s Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya shows pictures during the UN Security Council meeting discussing US biological warfare labs in Ukraine, on March 11, 2022. Photo: IC

US harvests labs & scientists after Soviet dissolution

After the Cold War ended, the US harvested a large number of bio-labs and scientists from the former Soviet Union with the excuse of "preventing bio weapons threats."

After the Soviet Union collapsed, Russia did not have enough money to destroy the nuclear and biological weapons inherited from the Soviet states.

In 1991, US senators Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar promoted related legislation, through which the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (CTR) was set up to address these weapons of mass destruction.

The program was supervised by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and included the Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (CBEP). Related efforts have been extended repeatedly by Washington and lasted for decades.

According to an article of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in 2008, the initial focus of the program was on the nuclear weapons inherited by Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine and on Russia's nuclear weapons, materials, and facilities.

Following the successful denuclearization of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, and with a bulk of the most pressing Russian nuclear proliferation threats resolved, CTR's efforts turned its focus to dealing with biothreats.

However, the CBEP gradually became different from what it was intended for. The US did not destroy all facilities storing dangerous pathogens in Soviet states, instead, it upgraded many labs. These labs, although located outside the US, are in fact controlled by Washington and their materials and research results have been transferred to the US, according to documents recently disclosed by Russia.

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, tens of thousands of scientists lost their jobs. With the excuse to prevent these scientists from going to "rogue countries" for a living, the US established the Civilian Research & Development Foundation (CRDF) to recruit related scientists.

According to open materials, the US passed related legislation in 1992 and established the CRDF in 1995. Founders of the CRDF include public agencies like the US State Council and the US Department of Defense as well as private agencies such as the Open Society Foundations, founded by American billionaire George Soros.

At first, the US Department of Defense allocated $5 million for the launch of CRDF and Soros donated another $10 million. Yearly budget for the CRDF was about $10 million at the beginning. In 2000, then US president Bill Clinton proposed that the spending of the CRDF that year should be tripled from $64 million to $176.5 million.

US goes back on its words

In 2001, a decade after the end of the Cold War, the US made clear its opposition to the establishment of a multilateral verification mechanism for the BWC, probably because of its intensifying research on biological weapons and the improvement of its own biological research capabilities.

John Bolton, then US undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs, in 2002 explained three reasons why the US rejected the Draft Protocol to the BWC: first, it was based on a traditional arms control approach that will not work on biological weapons; second, it would have compromised national security and confidential business information; and third, it would have been used by proliferators to undermine other effective international export control regimes.

Biological arms control has its particularities, but the measures including declaration, visit and verification proposed in the Draft Protocol to the BWC are feasible and supported by most countries, Guo Xiaobing, a research fellow with the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, responded to the US' "explanation."

The US seems to have a skeleton in its closet in the field of biology, Guo said. The biological laboratories at Fort Detrick, for instance, severely lack transparency, and it is unclear whether the US is pursuing biological weapons under the guise of defensive biological researches, he added.

Wang believes that there are deeper reasons for the US' rejection of a verification regime. First of all, the US has put its domestic politics ahead of the common interests of the international community. Both the BWC and the Draft Protocol to the BWC are the result of the contracting parties maximizing international interests and seeking common ground while putting aside differences. But the volatile political climate in the US can easily break this fragile balance.

Secondly, the driving mechanism of the US to resolve the biological weapons issue has changed, Wang said. The development of biological technologies, including synthetic biology and gene editing, has prompted the US to reexamine the strategic value of biological weapons. In the name of protecting itself against bio-terrorism threats, the US has drastically increased its bio-defense budget. It becomes an important strategic goal of the US to maintain its superiority and hegemony in biotechnology, and to achieve absolute security in the field of biology.

Thirdly, out of the protection of the military and industrial interests of the US and its allies, the US is wary of the multilateral agreements on biological weapons arms control that require transparency and are governed by international laws, said Wang. And the lobbying of American biopharmaceutical and biotechnology industries pushes the US further away from the negotiating table of the verification protocol, he added.

US' credit deficits under dark records

Despite US President Joe Biden's recent solemn statement that Washington has no biological and chemical weapons in Europe, no one can take his statement at face value as the US has lost its credibility over repeated lies throughout the years. After World War II, the US sought to gain an edge in biological weapons research by making a secret deal with Japan to protect the Japanese war criminal, microbiologist Shiro Ishii who led Unit 731. Located near Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, and at the time occupied by Japanese invaders, Unit 731 was notorious for conducting Japanese biological warfare experiments. Ishii later served as a bioweapons consultant at Fort Detrick Biological Warfare Laboratories.

In addition, after the end of World War II, the US "recruited" a large number of Nazi scientists. One of them was Kurt Blome, director of the Nazi Biological Warfare Program.

Several US-funded biological laboratories have been found to have carried out deadly human experiments. The location of Washington's overseas biological laboratories also overlaps with the site of many reported local accidents.

The US remains the only country in the world that still possesses chemical weapons. It also stands alone in opposing the establishment of the verification regime. The country has twice exceeded the time limit to destroy all its chemical weapons stockpiles despite repeated requests by the international community. It is also tight-lipped about research carried out in biological laboratories overseas.

Faced with Russia's evidence, the US simply tried to dismiss it as "disinformation." As Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao said, the US responses so far have been self-contradictory and perplexing.

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US pardoned Japan’s war criminals in exchange for Unit 731 chemical weapons – how trustworthy is its clarification on Ukraine labs?

 

The US is a country with a long history of using and developing chemical and biological weapons in other countries, and such moves, that contravene human rights bills and international laws that could be traced back to 1940s after World War II, have been largely ignored by most mainstream Western media outlets, and analysts have predicted that the US' dirty record in this field could spike global concerns over its recent operating of biological laboratories worldwide.

According to information gathered and gleaned from interviews done by the Global Times reporters, the US government has cooperated and colluded with Japanese war criminals to obtain data and technologies for the making of biological and chemical weapons for which Japan conducted inhumane live human experiments on innocent Chinese people during Japan's invasion of China.

Most of the data and files collected by said Japanese war criminals were acquired by scientists in Fort Detrick, the center of the US' biological weapons program, and after the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was established in 1947, the agency participated in the relevant research pertaining to the development of biowarfare weapons.

Ruins of Japan's notorious Unit 731 facilities in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province Photo: VCG

Ruins of Japan's notorious Unit 731 facilities in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province Photo: VCG

Nasty cooperation

Unit 731, infamous for conducting Japanese biological warfare experiments, was located near Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, which was occupied by Japanese invaders. The monstrous unit was created by Japanese war criminal, microbiologist Shiro Ishii in 1936, and eventually was comprised of 150 buildings and had the capacity to hold 600 people at a time to be experimented on, according to the book titled Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare, 1932-1945, and the American Cover-up.

Unit 731's experiments involved deliberately infecting people, primarily Chinese prisoners of war and civilians, with infectious agents, and exposing prisoners to bombs designed to penetrate the skin with infectious particles.

In 1945-46, representatives of the US government made similar discoveries in both Germany and Japan, unearthing evidence of unethical experiments conducted on human beings.

However, the US played an equally key role in concealing information about biological warfare experiments by Japan and secured immunity from prosecution for the perpetrators. Along with the data from Unit 731 and experiments inside Fort Detrick, Howard Brody, director at the Institute for the Medical Humanities, University of Texas Medical Branch, shared in an article released in 2014 details of the shady deal, titled United States Responses to Japanese Wartime Inhuman Experimentation after World War II: National Security and Wartime Exigency.

Masks used by Japan's notorious Unit 731 are exhibited in a museum in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province. Photo: VCGMasks used by Japan's notorious Unit 731 are exhibited in a museum in Harbin, Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province. Photo: VCG

Fort Detrick, which is an enormous complex, has, for decades, been the center of American military research related to biology with only a select few being privy to details of operations, Stephen Kinzer, senior fellow at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University, was cited by the Xinhua News Agency in a report in July 2021.

Kinzer is the author of bestseller Poisoner in Chief, which revealed the little-known life story of Sidney Gottlieb, master CIA chemist and head of secret mind control experiments at Fort Detrick and elsewhere in the world.

He said in order to find out "the limits of human endurance - how can you kill people, at what moment do they die, how can you seize control of their bodies and their minds," Gottlieb and the CIA hired "Nazi doctors who worked on the concentration camps, and their Japanese comrades," for example, war criminal Shiro Ishii, who headed the notorious Japanese military biological warfare program called Unit 731 during World War II.

Keep it in the dark

The CIA and the US Army Chemical Corps worked closely together. When the US finalized its secret agreement of cooperation with Shiro Ishii and Unit 731 after World War II, it was decided that the cooperation would be kept strictly within "intelligence channels," Jeffrey Kaye, a former clinical psychologist in San Francisco, told the Global Times.

Kaye wrote a book published in 2017 on the torture of detainees in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, and later started his research into US biological warfare during the Korean War (1950-53), most documents of which were systematically redacted and destroyed during the McCarthy era.

Kaye said that such cooperation was kept top secret and purely on a need-to-know basis. From 1949, the CIA had a unit inside Fort Detrick - which was called Camp Detrick back in those days - which researched and developed biological weapons for use in covert operations.

"Much of this was done in a CIA program known as MKNAOMI. It was this unit, called the Special Operations Division, that developed, for instance, the feather bomb, which was an adapted bomb used to deliver propaganda leaflets, except instead it delivered feathers and similar material coated with pathogens like anthrax. The use of infected feathers for such warfare was pioneered by Unit 731," Kaye revealed.

Kaye said that although he does not have a document that specifically states the US got the idea from Unit 731, it is still a reasonable inference to make given the known level of alliance between Japanese units like the Unit 731 and Fort Detrick, that the feather bomb idea came from contact with Unit 731. Moreover, an official from Fort Detrick who was involved with the initial interviews of Unit 731 officers after the war, Colonel Murray Sanders, told two British researchers that Ishii was brought to lecture at Fort Detrick. In addition, the chief of the CIA Special Operations Division at Fort Detrick, John Schwab, submitted an affidavit under oath in a criminal trial in 1959 that the US had the means to conduct biological warfare as far back as 1949, according to Kaye.

An aerial view of the barracks in Camp Detrick (later Fort Detrick) in Maryland, September 24, 1944 

Photo: VCGAn aerial view of the barracks in Camp Detrick (later Fort Detrick) in Maryland, September 24, 1944 Photo: VCG

Biolabs worldwide

Russian President Vladimir Putin gave an extensive speech on the Ukraine crisis on March 16 and he pointed out that the US is conducting military biological programs in Ukraine.

"There was a network of dozens of laboratories in Ukraine, where military biological programs were conducted under the guidance and with the financial support of the Pentagon, including experiments with coronavirus strains, anthrax, cholera, African swine fever, and other deadly diseases," Putin said during his speech.

Russia's Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya shows pictures during the UN Security Council meeting discussing US biological warfare labs in Ukraine, on March 11, 2022. Photo: ICRussia's Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya shows pictures during the UN Security Council meeting discussing US biological warfare labs in Ukraine, on March 11, 2022. Photo: IC

This is the latest example to spark global concern over the US' biolabs worldwide. According to the information provided by the US to the Conference of Parties of the Biological Weapon Convention (BWC), there are 336 US laboratories around the world. Scientists and analysts from all around the globe have once again expressed their worries and concerns over the US biological programs.

But unfortunately, effectively enforcing the law when it comes to the US under the influence of US hegemony remains an enduring problem for the international community, said experts, noting that the countries most affected by the US biological programs should push the US to accept the protocol for monitoring biological weapons by the BWC.

US' dirty records of using, developing bio, chemical weapons. Graphic: Zhao Jun/GTUS' dirty records of using, developing bio, chemical weapons. Graphic: Zhao Jun/GT

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Thursday, March 17, 2022

US' bio-web

Graphic: GT

Editor's Note: 

US-funded bio-labs reportedly discovered in Ukraine have attracted global attention as many question the US' inconsistent responses regarding the matter, for a full clarification of its bio-military activities within and outside its borders. The Global Times lays out the spread of the US' Cooperative Biological Engagement Program and wide concerns over its labs' potential risks and safety loopholes. 

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Chinese FM raises six key questions on US bio labs in Ukraine, demanding truth

 Screengrab of Russian Defence Ministry briefing showing US-sponsored biolabs on Ukraininan territory. Photo : Russian Ministry of Defence

Screengrab of Russian Defence Ministry briefing showing US-sponsored biolabs on Ukraininan territory. Photo : Russian Ministry of Defence
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At Monday's routine news conference of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, the spokesperson for the ministry rebutted the US' inconsistent and flawed responses regarding its biological laboratories in Ukraine, urging a full clarification of its bio-military activities within and outside its borders.
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When a BBC reporter asked that the US claims seem to suggest that its secret research involving viruses in Ukraine has nothing to do with the military, Zhao Lijian, the ministry's spokesperson, directly pointed out that the US' response to the issue so far has been contradictory and confusing.
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Under a 2005 agreement between the US and Ukraine, US Department of Defense representatives are authorized to participate in all activities related to Ukrainian facilities, and Ukraine is prohibited from releasing information that the US determines to be "sensitive."
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According to the US submission to the 2021 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) Meeting of States Parties, the US has 26 laboratories and other cooperative facilities in Ukraine.
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"We can't help but ask: Did the US send teams to Ukraine or not? What exactly is the scope of their activities? How many collaborative facilities are there? What sensitive information in the field of public health is not allowed to be disclosed? Does Ukraine know what the US is doing in Ukraine?" Zhao asked.
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Public information shows that tens of biological laboratories in Ukraine were operated on the orders of the US Department of Defense, that the US has invested more than $200 million in these laboratory activities, and that US research was aimed at establishing mechanisms for the covert spread of deadly viral pathogens.
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Russian officials said that Russia found more than 30 biological laboratories affiliated with the US on the territory of Ukraine and that the relevant items were urgently destroyed, but traces of plague, anthrax and other pathogens were found.
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While the US initially slammed information about its bio warfare labs in Ukraine as "fake," on March 8, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland admitted the existence of US-funded "biological research facilities" in the country.
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"If the information released by the US itself is inconsistent and full of loopholes, how can the international community believe that the US is fulfilling its BWC obligations?" Zhao asked.
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The US is the only country that opposes the establishment of a verification mechanism for the BWC. At the same time, for decades the US has been accusing other countries of not complying with the treaty, and even sanctioning and using force against these countries.
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"When it happens to the US, it evades inspection, which is a typical US double standard," Zhao said.
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The spokesman urged the US to make a full clarification of its bio-military activities within and outside its borders in a responsible manner and to stop opposing the establishment of a verification mechanism for the Biological Weapons Convention, which would help restore the international community's confidence in the US compliance with its international obligations and would also help raise the level of global biosecurity.
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The World Health Organization has "strongly recommended" to the Ministry of Health in Ukraine to safely destroy "high-threat pathogens" that might be housed within the country's public health labs in order to prevent "any potential spills."
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  `The horrific truth about the biological research labs in Ukraine.   AMERICA  CAUGHT   OPERATING  MANY   SECRET  BIO-WEAPON  LABS I...

 

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Saturday, March 12, 2022

US owes world an answer on bio lab as UN Security Council to hear Russian claim of US labs in Ukrain


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Top US Biological Weapons Expert Supports and Escalates Russia's Allegations about Ukraine's Biolabs

Dr Francis Boyle drafted America’s Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989. From Reagan times, he had been intimately involved in the whole scenario surrounding biological warfare research and the parties involved. He gives especial insights into the Ukrainian biolabs, and how that links to Wuhan, the pandemic and Fauci.
 
Eye-opening. Scary.
 


 

`The horrific truth about the biological research labs in Ukraine.

 

AMERICA  CAUGHT   OPERATING  MANY   SECRET  BIO-WEAPON  LABS IN  UKRAINE !!!.*
**************************** 

*WHEN  THE  RUSSIANS  EXPOSED  THE  EXISTENCE  OF  MANY  BIO-WEAPON  LABS   IN  UKRAINE ,  FUNDED  N  OPERATED  BY  USA  GOVT ,  THEY  WERE  DISMISSED  AS  RUSSIAN  DISINFORMATION.*

*NOW ,  UNDER  OATH  IN  CONGRESS ,  VICTORIA  NULAND ,   UNDER-SECRETARY OF  STATE  FOR  EUROPE ,  ADMITTED  THAT  THEY  EXISTED ,  WTF !!!.*

WHO advises Ukraine to destroy pathogens in public health labs to prevent disease spread

Russia, U.S. accuse each other at UNSC over military biological research in Ukraine

China urges U.S. to disclose more details about biolabs in Ukraine

China resolutely opposes development and use of bio-chemical weapons

 

Screengrab of Russian Defence Ministry briefing showing US-sponsored biolabs on Ukraininan territory. Photo : Russian Ministry of Defence

Screengrab of Russian Defence Ministry briefing showing US-sponsored biolabs on Ukraininan territory. Photo : Russian Ministry of Defence

The Russian Defense Ministry released on Thursday documents it acquired from the personnel of a bio lab in Ukraine. The documents expose the US and its NATO allies' research on biological weapons in Ukraine, including research on spreading the highly infectious bird flu virus through migratory birds and on pathogens such as bacteria and viruses that can be transmitted from bats to humans. Russia said the documents show that a large number of serum samples belonging to the Slavs have been transferred and that the experiments in Ukraine are similar to what Japan's Unit 731 did in WWII. The documents were uploaded online by Russia for free download.
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The US reaction has somewhat missed the point. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki made eight consecutive tweets to condemn Russia for spreading disinformation, but advoided mentioning about the US' bio lab in Ukraine. She claimed that "we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine." But she didn't offer any evidence. Such condemnation didn't help clear the doubts of people around the world. Instead, such a response is pale and illogical.
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Nevertheless, US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland confirmed during a hearing that Ukraine has "biological research facilities" when asked if Ukraine has bioweapons. She also said the US is working with Ukraine to prevent Russia from getting "those research materials."
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The contradictive remarks futher deepened the world's doubts about the US. Does the US have a bio lab in Ukraine? Why did the labs rush to destroy the materials right after Russia-Ukraine conflict started on February 24? Are those labs engaged in scientific research or weaponizing the research results? What is the relation between the Pentagon and the US' 336 bio labs around the world? How does the US guarantee the safety of those labs? Why has the US been exclusively blocking the establishment of the verification mechanism of the Biological Weapons Convention for more than 20 years? What is it worried about? What exactly is the connection between the Fort Detrick lab and the COVID-19 pandemic?
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Biological military activities are not trivial. It is reasonable and legitimate for the international community to question the US for that. Right after WWII, the US spent 250,000 yen (several thousand US dollars at that time) on acquiring the infamous Unit 731's data, but never published what the data was used for. In nearly 30 years, the number of P4 labs on US soil increased by 750 percent - accompanied by an increasing risk of virus leakage. Because of protests from within, the US chose to establish labs overseas. Over the years, however, there have been deadly leaks linked to US military biological labs in Ukraine, South Korea, Kazakhstan and Georgia. But angry protests in those countries were simply crushed by the US manipulating public opinion.
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Biological weapons are seen as weapons of mass destruction together with nuclear and chemical weapons. Any suspicion of private development of biological weapons must be promptly investigated. Russia's information release was very specific and should draw the attention of the international community. The veracity of those materials must be determined by a multi-party inspection team led by an authoritative international organization, rather than by the US alone. The US should know that smearing others cannot bleach itself. If it is really innocent as it claims, it should take the opportunity to publish what is the truth and receive multi-party investigations to prove its innocence.
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It must be pointed out that this was an accidental discovery in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which has nothing to do with the conflict itself. The determination of the merits of this incident should not be linked to the position on the Russia-Ukraine issue. The international community, including Europe, should put strong pressure on the US and not be swayed by the disinformation claims of Washington. The US owes the world an answer on this matter.

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Security Council to hear Russian claim of US labs in Ukraine

UN Russia Ukraine US Banned Weapons 

UN Russia Ukraine US Banned Weapons

The U.N. Security Council scheduled a meeting Friday at Russia’s request to discuss what Moscow claims are “the military biological activities of the U.S. on the territory of Ukraine,” allegations vehemently denied by Ukraine's leader and the Biden administration.

“This is exactly the kind of false flag effort we have warned Russia might initiate to justify a biological or chemical weapons attack," Olivia Dalton, spokesperson for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, said late Thursday. “We’re not going to let Russia gaslight the world or use the U.N. Security Council as a venue for promoting their disinformation.“

The Russian request, announced in a tweet Thursday afternoon from its first deputy U.N. ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky, follows the U.S. rejection of Russian accusations that Ukraine is running chemical and biological labs with U.S. support.

In response to this week’s accusations by Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova — made without evidence — White House press secretary Jen Psaki warned that Russia might use chemical or biological weapons against Ukraine, the neighbor it has invaded.

Psaki called Russia’s claim “preposterous” and tweeted: “This is all an obvious ploy by Russia to try to justify its further premeditated, unprovoked, and unjustified attack on Ukraine.”

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Ukraine - day 16: Russia's bioweapons claim, YouTube state media ban ..

https://newseu.cgtn.com/news/2022-03-11/Ukraine-day-16-Positive-shift-in-talks-4-5-million-homeless-18jOF0W4QMg/index.html 
 
 Russia's ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia accused Ukraine of manufacturing biological weapons in a Security Council meeting./Timothy A Clary/AFP
 
 
 
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Photo: VCG

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