Piotr
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Chechen forcies are risking their lives to liberate Mariupol and save civilians from Banderites. It is disrespectful to call this PR initiative.
2. Typical claims.
Do you even bother to do your own homework or rely upon hearsay and handouts?
Russian forces have destroyed much of Mariupol:
Clashes in Mariupol have led to creation of mass graves to bury the dead:
Red Cross says cannot reach Mariupol due to security conditions
A team of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has not been able to reach the besieged city of Mariupol on Monday to evacuate civilians, a spokesperson said, citing security conditions.www.reuters.com
Russian forces were targeting journalists in Mariupol:
These journalists documented the destruction in Mariupol and escaped as Russian forces hunted them down
AP journalists were warned by Ukrainian policeman that Russians would put them on camera and make them recant everything they had documentedwww.theglobeandmail.com
Nothing to hide, right?
What this video is meant to prove ? This is only small part of Mariupol. Compare all of Mariupol with all of Fallujah.
The Globeandmail ? Really ? This is Anglosaxon media. They lied about alleged WMD in Iraq. They have zero credibility.
3. WE live in times of cyberwarfare and fact-checking is increasingly important consideration in my view.
Fact-checking sources help clear misconceptions and unravel cyberwarfare efforts in discourses. I used fact-checking sources to address Russian biolabs narrative for Ukraine in following post:
Russia-Ukraine War - News and Developments
Russian forcies (including that from Chechnya) managed to prevent Bandera forces from attacking Donbass Republics. Massive Bandera attack against Donbass Republics was planed for March. Russian forcies managed to stop US development of nuclear and biologicas weapons in the territory of the...defence.pk
You typed another response in 2 minutes - this shows that you did not bother to check the links.
I had to extract information from the links for you to see:
Russia-Ukraine War - News and Developments
Russian forcies (including that from Chechnya) managed to prevent Bandera forces from attacking Donbass Republics. Massive Bandera attack against Donbass Republics was planed for March. Russian forcies managed to stop US development of nuclear and biologicas weapons in the territory of the...defence.pk
Now you are like: "Do you expect USA to admit that it worked on biological weapons ?"
Deflection continues.
My counter-question to you then: What about Russian bioweapons program in its homeland and Kazakhstan?
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Amid false Russian allegations of US “biolabs” in Ukraine, it’s worth asking: What is a bioweapon?
The Stepnogorsk biological weapons complex in Kazakhstan. Credit: US Department of Defense.
Earlier this month, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations all but accused the United States and Ukraine of having biological weapons. While governments around the world have signed an international treaty banning germ warfare, Russia, Vassily Nebenzia said, had “grounds to think that those hopes did not come true completely.” According to the ambassador, the Russian military had found proof that US-funded “biolabs” in Ukraine were engaged in nefarious research and were enhancing dangerous pathogens.
Experts say the documents that the Russian military allegedly acquired show that labs in Ukraine were working on public health research and aren’t evidence of a weapons program. Some of the Russian claims, at least, come from publicly available sources. At the heart of the allegations are dozens of labs in Ukraine. They are not a secret; they’re run by Ukrainian officials and partner with the US government on health research programs, for instance, surveys on natural exposure to endemic pathogens like hantavirus. These aren’t biological weapons laboratories, but the allegations raise important questions. Just what are bioweapons, anyway? How have they been used and developed throughout the years? And how can real bioweapons facilities be identified?
What is a biological weapon? George Mason University Professor Greg Koblentz, the director of the school’s biodefense graduate program, said the bacterium that causes anthrax infection has been the most commonly studied biological agent in modern biowarfare programs. That’s because Bacillus anthracis forms a spore that can be aerosolized and spread through the air, the main way to deliver a large-scale biological attack. “This is a very strenuous experience for the pathogen,” Koblentz said. “They don’t like being blown up. They don’t like UV radiation. They don’t like being suspended in air. This process will kill most of the bacteria or viruses in a biological weapon once it’s being disseminated. Anthrax spores provide that ability for them to survive that process much better than other pathogens.” With a fatality rate of 80 percent, inhaled anthrax bacteria can be a deadly weapon.
Other diseases, including the bacterial illness tularemia, have also been studied, but, Koblentz said, weapons programs have shied away from diseases like influenza that spread easily. While the Soviet Union did weaponize smallpox and plague, two contagious diseases, the US program tended to “shy away from” these agents, he said.
“You wouldn’t purposefully develop a biological weapon that is highly contagious that could cause a pandemic because that will affect your country along with everyone else,” Koblentz said.
Genoese fortifications at Caffa in present-day Ukraine. Credit: Janmad. CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons (color edited).
What is the history of biological warfare? By the 1300s, warring armies in Europe had arrived at the idea of using dead animals and people, including plague victims, as weapons. According to one historical account, a Mongol army in 1346 loaded plague victims on catapults and “hurled” them into Caffa, a fortified Genoese trading post in present-day Ukraine. In 1650, Kazimierz Siemienowicz, a Polish general, reportedly laced bullets with saliva from rabid dogs. And colonial British forces in the United States gave smallpox infested blankets to Native Americans on at least one occasion. But the best example of modern biowarfare, Koblentz said, comes from the Japanese invasion and occupation of China.
Japan’s infamous Unit 731 conducted grotesque experiments on prisoners to assess the effects of biological agents like the bacteria that causes cholera, including dissections on living, unanesthetized people. The unit allegedly experimented on at least 3,000 prisoners of war; an estimated 1,000 died, according to a 1997 report by the US Surgeon General.
But far from limiting its work to lab settings, the Japanese military also tested weapons on the public in Chinese cities. Planes would fly over communities and drop plague infested flees, attacks that were followed by reports of outbreaks. “What’s not well known is that they actually integrated their use of biological weapons with their conventional military operations in China,” Koblentz said.
Despite the horrors committed by Unit 731, several of its officials were given immunity from war crimes prosecution; the United States, which by then had its own offensive biological weapons program, sought to understand what the Japanese had learned.
Which countries have had biological weapons programs? According to a 2008 tabulation by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, more than 20 countries have or have had a biological weapons program.
Of those programs, the former Soviet Union once maintained the world’s most extensive. While the country had been developing bioweapons since the 1920s, the Soviet government secretly expanded that effort after signing the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. The Soviet program intended to capitalize on advances in genetic engineering to produce pathogens that were more suitable for weaponization than naturally occurring strains, and tens of thousands of scientists and others worked on the illicit effort. They conducted research to make hybrid pathogens with genetic material from more than one virus; pathogens that could elude diagnostic tests; and pathogens made up of both bacteria and viruses. The Soviets had the ability to produce massive amounts of anthrax agent and other pathogens, according to a 2002 Congressional Research Service report.
The United States also had a formidable weapons program. The military had a research and development lab at Ft. Detrick in Maryland, an open-air test site in Utah, and a production plant in Arkansas which produced biological agents and filled them into delivery devices, including spray tanks, bombs, and bomblets. According to a 2009 National Defense University case study, the program’s wares included lethal antipersonnel agents, incapacitating agents, and anti-crop weapons. The offensive program, however, ended in 1969, when President Richard Nixon, after an internal review, unilaterally abandoned the weapons and had the US stockpile destroyed.
That review found that pathogens take time to incubate, making them an impractical weapon during battle, and that they could mutate or establish themselves in animal species. Officials reasoned bioweapons couldn’t be used first without drawing international condemnation and, moreover, that the country had a powerful nuclear arsenal to deter an attack. The Army destroyed its supplies of the pathogens that cause anthrax, tuleremia, and other diseases between 1971 and 1972, along with tens of thousands of munitions filled with biological agents, according to the case study. The United States ratified the Biological Weapons Convention in 1975.
The US military tested biological warfare agents using the One-Million-Liter Test Sphere, also called the Eight Ball, at Ft. Detrick in Maryland. Credit: US Army.
How have biological weapons been tested? At Ft. Detrick, military researchers used a giant steel sphere known as the Eight Ball to test aerosolized agents on military volunteers. At the Dugway Proving Ground in the Utah desert, researchers conducted open-air experimentation, where germs were spread on the wind toward soldiers who had volunteered for tests. While researchers used animals in offensive weapons tests, the purpose of human tests was murkier, Koblentz said. More than 2,000 conscientious objectors, mainly from the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, participated in the Project Whitecoat program. That effort exposed volunteers to several diseases, including tularemia, which was eventually standardized as a biological weapons agent. The experiments led to knowledge that could be used in both in offensive weapons and for defensive purposes, Koblentz said.
The military also conducted various tests in public places using agents that could simulate dangerous pathogens. For example, researchers in the 1950 exposed the San Francisco Bay-area to aerosolized Bacillus globigii and Serratia marcescens, bacteria which were thought to be benign. According to the Surgeon General’s report, however, there were subsequent reports of infections in the surrounding communities.
Bioweapons accidents in the Soviet Union led to several deaths.
In 1971, a research vessel on the Aral Sea sailed near Vozrozhdeniya Island and into a “brownish haze.” The island was an out-door Soviet bioweapons testing site, and the haze was aerosolized version of the virus that causes smallpox. An infected crew member took the virus back home and nine people fell sick in a subsequent outbreak; three including the researcher’s brother died, according to a BBC report.
One of the worst bioweapons accidents happened in 1979 when anthrax spores leaked from a plant in the city of Sverdlovsk, now called Yekaterinburg. The leak killed at least 66 people, and perhaps more. A team that included Jeanne Guillemin and Matthew Meselson, noted bioweapons experts, plotted where each of the victims had been and, based on meteorological data, placed them in a zone downwind from the weapons plant known as Compound 19. The research showed that perhaps even less than 1 gram of anthrax spores—equivalent to a quarter teaspoon of salt—could kill many people. Had the wind been blowing toward Sverdlovsk, the death toll could have been far higher.
In 1992, former Russian President Boris Yeltsin acknowledged that the Sverdlovks outbreak had been caused by military activity and ordered an end to Russia’s offensive bioweapons program that year.
How can bioweapons programs be identified? Identifying a bioweapons program is no easy task, Koblentz said. That’s because many of the pathogens and equipment that would be necessary for an offensive program also have legitimate uses: “You can’t just look at a facility and say, ‘Oh, you have a fermenter of this size, therefore, it is civilian, or therefore it is part of a bioweapons program.’” The same goes for pathogen strains, he said. Labs might have virulent anthrax in order to produce vaccines or detection systems, for example, or because they’re dealing with public health outbreaks in the area. “Just seeing something there is by no means sufficient,” Koblentz said.
But by analyzing various facts about a site, Koblentz said, a facility’s true intention can be apparent.
Near the Kazakhstani city of Stepnogorsk, a Soviet biological weapons production facility contained “towering fermenters” that could produce two tons of anthrax in a day. The Stepnogorsk plant also produced civilian products, but the purpose of the facility was clear to analysts. “There was no plausible civilian rationale for having that production capacity,” Koblentz said. “Next door to that production building there were fortified bunkers that were designed to store the ammunition that this anthrax would go into. So looking at this combination of facilities and capabilities, you could say this is a biological weapons production facility.”
Inspectors and analysts don’t have access to all facilities they suspect of being involved in biological weapons activities. The US government, for instance, has alleged that Russia still maintains an offensive biological weapons program. Even without access, Koblentz said, there are ways to assess whether a country has an offensive program. The US government, for example, has accused a military facility at Sergiev Posad of being part of the program. “The fact that this is a military facility, it’s top secret, no outsiders are allowed in, [the] lack of transparency in itself is a tell,” Koblentz said.
In contrast, Koblentz said, the recent Russian allegations of illegitimate biological research being conducted in Ukraine rely on publicly available information. “The Russians were putting up slides being used at scientific conferences. These researchers are publishing in peer reviewed journals, right?” he said. “You don’t do that if you’re trying to hide a secret bioweapons program in Ukraine.”
How are biological weapons regulated? The Biological Weapons Convention has 183 members, called states parties. By contrast, just 10 countries have not signed or ratified the treaty. The treaty doesn’t ban pathogens or the equipment like fermenters used to work with them, biosecurity expert Filippa Lentzos said at a recent event. “We’re saying, ‘You’re not allowed to use it if it’s not for peaceful purposes.’ It comes down to intent.” While the convention has helped shape norms against biological weapons, some observers point to a gap in the agreement, the lack of a “formal verification regime to monitor compliance.” As it stands, members participate in confidence-building measures, for example, by sharing reports on biological research centers and biodefense initiatives. Violating the treaty, Koblentz said, doesn’t necessarily come with a steep price. “The treaty itself doesn’t have any real penalties and given the difficulty of proving in an unclassified way that a country is in violation—it’s challenging,” he said. “That’s been a major weakness in the whole bioweapons non-proliferation regime from the beginning.”
Part of why the Soviet Union proceeded to expand its bioweapons program after joining the Biological Weapons Convention was because officials thought that Nixon’s order to end the US offensive program was a ruse and that the United States was continuing to develop offensive capabilities. Some fear that false accusations about bioweapons programs, like the recent Russian disinformation, could erode trust and weaken the norm that prohibits the operation of clandestine programs. Well-documented cases of countries using bioweapons in war have been rare. But if a country were to reverse course, as the Sverdlovks anthrax leak suggests, the results could be catastrophic.
Amid false Russian allegations of US “biolabs” in Ukraine, it’s worth asking: What is a bioweapon?
Just what is a bioweapon anyway? Production and research facilities for these destructive weapons aren't always easy to spot.thebulletin.org
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Russia and Kazakhstan should also be investigated for bioweapons program on the grounds of TRANSPARENCY and FAIRNESS.
Agreed?
Pot calling Kettle black otherwise.
Oh my gosh...
Let us consider the example of the famous Chinese virologist Zhengli Shi:
Prof. Shi is the director of the Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases of the Wuhan Institute of Virology. She got her Ph.D training at Montpellier University II, France, from 1996 to 2000. Her research focuses on viral pathogen discovery through traditional and high-throughput sequencing techniques. She has been studying the wildlife-borne viral pathogens, particularly bat-borne viruses since 2004. Her group has discovered diverse novel viruses/virus antibodies in bats, including SARS-like coronaviruses, adenoviruses, adeno-associated viruses, circoviruses, paramyxoviruses and filoviruses in China. One of her great contributions is to uncover genetically diverse SARS-like coronaviruses in bats with her international collaborators and provide unequivocal evidence that bats are natural reservoirs of SARS-CoV. She has coauthored >130 publications on viral pathogen identification, diagnosis and epidemiology.
Zhengli Shi - World Society for Virology
The director of the Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.www.ws-virology.org
She should be arrested for her experiments on samples of the coronavirus among others?
Public statement for collaboration on COVID-19 vaccine development
Under WHO’s coordination, a group of experts with diverse backgrounds is working towards the development of vaccines against COVID-19.www.who.int
Many countries around the world have established Institutes of Virology (Medical Sciences initiative). These institutes collect and store virus samples for research purposes and attempt to develop vaccines. These institutes exist in Iran, Pakistan, China and Russia as well.
It would be rather convenient to misrepresent these practices for bioweapons research with cyberwarfare initiatives.
Get it now?
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It makes sense to move those virus samples out from war-torn Ukraine if they were stored in any medical facility. Russian forces are shelling Ukrainian towns and cities and these activities could result in leaks of viruses which will exacerbate humanitarian crisis in the region.
This is whataboutism. We are talking about US bioweapons in the Ukraine are we ?
What you post is US narrative, not facts. It is clear that USA has something to hide.
FACTS:
US owes world an answer on bio lab: Global Times editorial
By Global Times Published: Mar 11, 2022 11:54 PM
The Russian Defense Ministry released on Thursday documents it acquired from the personnel of a bio lab in Ukraine. The documents expose the US and its NATO allies' research on biological weapons in Ukraine, including research on spreading the highly infectious bird flu virus through migratory birds and on pathogens such as bacteria and viruses that can be transmitted from bats to humans. Russia said the documents show that a large number of serum samples belonging to the Slavs have been transferred and that the experiments in Ukraine are similar to what Japan's Unit 731 did in WWII. The documents were uploaded online by Russia for free download.
The US reaction has somewhat missed the point. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki made eight consecutive tweets to condemn Russia for spreading disinformation, but advoided mentioning about the US' bio lab in Ukraine. She claimed that "we should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine." But she didn't offer any evidence. Such condemnation didn't help clear the doubts of people around the world. Instead, such a response is pale and illogical.
Nevertheless, US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland confirmed during a hearing that Ukraine has "biological research facilities" when asked if Ukraine has bioweapons. She also said the US is working with Ukraine to prevent Russia from getting "those research materials."
The contradictive remarks futher deepened the world's doubts about the US. Does the US have a bio lab in Ukraine? Why did the labs rush to destroy the materials right after Russia-Ukraine conflict started on February 24? Are those labs engaged in scientific research or weaponizing the research results? What is the relation between the Pentagon and the US' 336 bio labs around the world? How does the US guarantee the safety of those labs? Why has the US been exclusively blocking the establishment of the verification mechanism of the Biological Weapons Convention for more than 20 years? What is it worried about? What exactly is the connection between the Fort Detrick lab and the COVID-19 pandemic?
Biological military activities are not trivial. It is reasonable and legitimate for the international community to question the US for that. Right after WWII, the US spent 250,000 yen (several thousand US dollars at that time) on acquiring the infamous Unit 731's data, but never published what the data was used for. In nearly 30 years, the number of P4 labs on US soil increased by 750 percent - accompanied by an increasing risk of virus leakage. Because of protests from within, the US chose to establish labs overseas. Over the years, however, there have been deadly leaks linked to US military biological labs in Ukraine, South Korea, Kazakhstan and Georgia. But angry protests in those countries were simply crushed by the US manipulating public opinion.
Biological weapons are seen as weapons of mass destruction together with nuclear and chemical weapons. Any suspicion of private development of biological weapons must be promptly investigated. Russia's information release was very specific and should draw the attention of the international community. The veracity of those materials must be determined by a multi-party inspection team led by an authoritative international organization, rather than by the US alone. The US should know that smearing others cannot bleach itself. If it is really innocent as it claims, it should take the opportunity to publish what is the truth and receive multi-party investigations to prove its innocence.
It must be pointed out that this was an accidental discovery in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which has nothing to do with the conflict itself. The determination of the merits of this incident should not be linked to the position on the Russia-Ukraine issue. The international community, including Europe, should put strong pressure on the US and not be swayed by the disinformation claims of Washington. The US owes the world an answer on this matter.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202203/1254649.shtml?id=11
