The Foreign Ministry of Honduras has been selected to manage implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention in the country, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons announced Thursday (see GSN, Sept. 7, 2005).
The convention requires that all member states establish or designate a national authority to manage contact with other CWC member nations and with the Hague-based organization that monitors compliance with the pact.
"The national authority is responsible for implementing the provisions of the Chemical Weapons Convention 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 to 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."
Honduras in 2005 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 three of the 188 member nations to the Chemical Weapons Convention had set national authorities as of Thursday (Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons release, Nov. 5).