MOSCOW. March 11 (Interfax-AVN) - The Russian Ammunition Agency thinks a recent statement by U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Defense Lisa Bronson that about 40 biological weapons facilities of the former Soviet Union are dangerous because of insufficient safety and control is unfounded.
"This is an old song. The United States attributes all of our medical institutions that work with pathogenic organisms to facilities that allegedly worked with biological weapons in the past. We need these pathogenic organisms to make vaccine, diagnostic, preventive and medical preparations. They have nothing to do with biological weapons," the Agency's deputy chief of the department for conventional problems of chemical and biological weapons Valery Spirande told Interfax-Military News Agency on Thursday.
Russia does not have biological weapons, he stressed. "An official statement to this effect has been made at the United Nations. We supply information about biological facilities to international organizations each year. Such facilities are well known, and there is nothing secret about them," he said.
Yet the terrorist threat requires tighter physical protection of facilities that contain pathogenic organisms, Spirande said. "This is being done at all facilities," he said.
Spirande defined pathogenic organisms as microbes and virus that could cause human or animal diseases. Pathogenic organisms are divided into four classes depending on the level of hazard. "Naturally, all facilities are divided into categories depending on the substances they contain, and sanitary, hygienic, anti- epidemic and physical protection measures are being taken there," he said.
Pathogenic organisms are also stored in medical museums under strict control by the Sanitary and Epidemiological Inspectorate, he said.