MOSCOW. March 24 (Interfax-AVN) - The Russian Ammunition Agency is holding a restricted-access tender on selecting main companies that are to implement projects aimed at the destruction of combat poisonous substances at chemical weapons storages in the localities of Shchuchye, Pochepe, Maradykovo, Leonidovka, Kizner, Kambarka and Gorny.
The opening of envelops and discussion of applications for the tender took place in the Ammunition Agency on Monday.
"This is one of the most principal and responsible tenders in the whole history of the chemical weapons scrapping program for the case concerns the selection of companies that are to accomplish a historical and responsible mission," the Ammunition Agency's Director General Zinovy Pak told Interfax-Military News Agency.
He said that the fulfillment of functions of the state customer by the Ammunition Agency in 2002 proved that the current system of non-existence of the main company brings along a lot of mistakes, drawbacks when forming a state order and implementing it. That is why the Ammunition Agency announced such a tender.
In accordance with conditions of the tender the state customer hands to main executors functions on maintaining the project at all stages including projecting, construction, use, destruction or conversion of chemical weapons stocks.
In particular, the main executing company will project, construct and use special installations on chemical weapons scrapping, destroy or converse those installations after the scrapping ends, provision of security to people and environment protection during the transportation, selection of samples, stocking and destruction of those chemical weapons in accordance with the Russian legislation, holding of R&D works, development of social infrastructure on territories envisaged for the location of installations for the weapons' destruction, information support and explanation work with population when constructing and using the installations, forming of the balance of property, provision of its maintenance and use including that of the social sphere, cooperation with the controlling company of the partner country in accordance with agreements on the global partnership.
Pak said that due to the fact that the scrapping concerns more than confidential information the tender is the restricted- access one.
"We involve only those organizations in the tender that have the right of access to confidential information," Pak noted.
Among those companies are the GosNIIOKhT, the Khimprom companies in Cheboksary and Volgograd that earlier produced arms, Bazalt enterprise that was involved in the development of chemical weapons and ammo of other purpose, the Prikladnaya Khimiya research center which is the main company on special chemicals and missile fuel, central R&D center of chemicals and mechanics which produced and exploited dangerous products, Soyuz federal center of dual technologies that designer and constructed plants on the production of missile fuel, Kirov plant in Perm, central R&D bureau subordinate to the Rosoboronexport company and which designed safe technologies and equipment, elaborated rules of using explosive products as well as the Altai research and production company and Applied Chemistry Institute located in the town of Sergiyev-Posad.
The tender's results are planned to be summed up a week later. After that treaties will be signed with winning companies and work will start.