Chemical weapons treaty ratification races clock in Congressional hearings
The pounding of the gavel in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing room on Tuesday served as the starting gun signaling the beginning of the Senate's race toward a July finish line: US ratification of the chemical weapons treaty. President Clinton sent the treaty to Congress for Senate consent to ratification and for House and Senate approval of implementing legislation soon after the US signed it on Jan. 13. But the crush of other Congressional business--domestic legislation and other arms control agreements--has, in the words of one Congressional staffer, kept this accord off the members' radar screens.'' That is, until this week, when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held its first in a series of hearings on the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). At the hearing, top officials from the State Department and the Arms Control Disarmament Agency offered an overview of the treaty and US obligations under it. After the committees get past a general understanding of the accord's requirements, they will begin probing for problems. Issues likely to be explored include the treaty's verifiability; its effect on industry, and especially whether confidential business information can be protected; the US's ability to meet the accord's chemical weapons destruction schedule; and Russia's ability to destroy its chemical stocks. Costs that the US will bear to support the international organization now being set up to implement and monitor the treaty, and financial aid to the Russians for destruction of their chemical arms, also will be scrutinized.
- OSTI ID:
- 7046622
- Journal Information:
- Chemical and Engineering News; (United States), Vol. 72:12; ISSN 0009-2347
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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