CHEMICAL ARMS TO LEAK FROM RUSSIA? EXPERTS RULE OUT

MOSCOW. April 26 (RIA Novosti) - Chemical weaponry cannot leave Russia by any means, reassures Alexander Eremkin, deputy chief of the Federal Agency for Chemical Weapons Safe Storage and Disposal. Arsenals and destruction factories are well guarded, with sentries, monitoring cameras and barbed wire in several rows, to say nothing of conventional burglar alarms. All Russian-based projects had the entire arrangement thoroughly updated according to the latest standards several years ago.

Experts from The Hague regularly check the projects down to the last item. There is no leakage.

Russia's conditions for chemical arms storage and destruction ensure full compliance with the 1972 Convention on the Prohibition of Chemical Arms, and allow to dispose of all arsenals by 2012, added Mr. Eremkin.

He flatly rules out even the slightest chance of terrorists ever laying their hands on Russian chemical weapons or poisonous substances, he replied a Novosti reporter.

The conference of convention signatory countries had its 7th session, October 11, 2002, to determine deadlines for Russian chemical arsenal destruction. 20 per cent is to be destroyed by April 29, 2007, 45 per cent April 29, 2009, and the entire stock by April 29, 2012.

Russia had roughly 40,000 tonnes of poisonous agents by the destruction start in 2002.