The Foreign Ministry of the Bahamas has been selected to manage implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention in the country, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons announced Friday (see GSN, April 24).
The convention requires that all member states establish or designate a "national authority" to manage contact with other nations and with the Hague-based organization that monitors compliance with the pact.
"The national authority has the responsibility of implementing the provisions of the CWC at the national level. To meet its basic obligations, each state party must be able to submit all the required declarations, communicate with the OPCW, cooperate with other states parties, facilitate OPCW inspections, respond to OPCW requests for assistance, protect the confidentiality of classified information, monitor and enforce national compliance, and cooperate in the peaceful uses of chemistry. States parties are also obliged to declare and eliminate all chemical weapons stockpiles and chemical weapons production facilities," according to an OPCW press release. "The national authority plays an indispensable role in all of these activities."
The Bahamas in April joined the pact that prohibits development, production, stockpiling, transfer or use of chemical warfare materials such as mustard blister agent and the nerve agents sarin and VX.
All but six of the 188 member nations to the Chemical Weapons Convention had set national authorities by last week (Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons release, Aug. 21).