The United States, again rowing against most world opinion, today rejected as unworkable a proposed international plan for enforcing a 30-year ban on using germs in warfare.
In a speech to a special drafting committee in Geneva, Washington's representative Ambassador Donald Mahley said the United States could not support the proposal, the result of nearly a decade of international wrangling.
"In our assessment, the draft protocol would put national security and confidential business information at risk," he said.
The plan, drawn up by Ambassador Tibor Toth of Hungary, chairman of the Ad Hoc negotiating group, was designed to meet a mandate from the 140-state 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention to produce a consensus on measures to make the ban enforceable by the end of this year.
Unlike other multilateral arms accords, the biological weapons ban contains no mechanism to ensure compliance.
While reaffirming its commitment to combating the spread of biological weapons, the United States said the measures outlined in the draft would not achieve their goal.
It said it planned to make alternative proposals, but did not specify when.
The draft, which other members of the 54-state Ad Hoc committee have said at least formed the basis for further negotiation, would oblige member states to make public sites that could be used for the development of biological weapons.
It also sets out a series of steps for verification, including spot checks.
But the US said the checks would not stop cheating by states wanting to develop biological weapons and could open the door to industrial espionage.
In order to be approved, the draft germ warfare proposal needed consensus support within the Ad Hoc committee.
The committee was to have continued meeting until August 17 in a bid to meet the deadline imposed by the Convention, which convenes on November 19.
It was not immediately clear what action the Ad Hoc group would take in view of the US stance.