MOSCOW, April 25 (AVN) - The State Duma lower house of Russian parliament has approved in the first hearing the amendments to the federal law "Concerning the Chemical Weapons Scrapping" practically unanimously with 317 votes in favour and two against, Pyotr Rogonov, the law draft maker, told the Military News Agency on Wednesday.
The second article of the law will remain as follows, "The chemical weapons scrapping takes place on chemical weapons scrapping installations located in the Russian Federation regions where the chemical weapons storage installations are being located."
Russian authorities ratified the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of All Types of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction on November 5, 1997 and took obligations to completely scrap its chemical weapons during the forthcoming 10 years. The Russian authorities also approved the federal law "Concerning the Chemical Weapons Scrapping" on May 2, 1997 which states legal basics of chemical weapons scrapping works and the order of the measure implementation. The weapons should be scrapped at the storage installations in accordance with the law. There are six sites in Russia for chemical weapons storaging, but the lack of finance and the strict order of scrapping does not permit to implement the programme. That is why the State Duma proposed the draft on granting Russia with the right to scrap chemical weapons not at six but at two to three sites.
The transportation of chemical weapons will be financed by means allocated for the programme implementation from the budget. The transportation security problem is quite serious but its expenses will be several times lower than those for the construction of plants for chemical weapons scrapping at all storage sites, Rogonov said.
The Russian government supports the draft approval.