Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations

Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations

Statement by Ambassador Vitaly I. Churkin, Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations, during the Security Council meeting on the situation in Libya

July 22, 2016

 

We regard the adoption of resolution 2298 (2016), authorizing the transfer of chemical weapons stockpiles from Libya and their subsequent destruction as an important step in chemical demilitarization. Given the intensified presence of various terrorist groups in Libya, this step is a timely. There was an eminent danger of those chemical weapons falling into their hands.

The examples of Syria and Iraq have shown how acute the problem of chemical terrorism is for the region. Not enough is being done to combat the problem today, occasionally owing to artificially politicized reasons. However, the Russian Federation has always strongly advocated concrete initiatives enabling a collective response commensurate with the threat.

We believe that the containers of chemical weapons that have been transported to the coast must be removed from Libya as quickly as possible and safely destroyed. The Security Council will keep a close watch on that operation. We stress that the destruction of all Libyan stockpiles of chemical weapons must be carried out in strict compliance with the relevant procedures of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). That is especially important because it was recently shown that during the long-term storage of toxic substances, stockpiles shrank by 220 tons. This phenomenon must be explained and justified in a scientific manner within the framework of the ongoing OPCW investigations. Similar requirements should be applied to all States parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention. We must be absolutely sure that dangerous toxic substances do not fall into the hands of terrorists.