Biolaboratories again: Zakharova triumphs - documents on cooperation with Ukraine have been declassified in the United States. But there was nothing new in them

Representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova once again “exposed” Ukrainian laboratories funded by the United States, which allegedly produce biological weapons. Now her attention was drawn to a new batch of documents declassified by the office of Tulsi Gabbard, who is leaving the post of US director of national intelligence:

Telegram https://t.me/MariaVladimirovnaZakharova/13224

The topic was further developed by Putin’s special representative for investment and economic cooperation with foreign countries, Kirill Dmitriev, saying that Gabbard confirmed “Russia’s truth about the Obama/Biden biological laboratories in Ukraine, which threatened the whole world,” which was previously “denied by the ‘deep state’ and traditional media.”

The Kremlin media also got involved: “Arguments and Facts” published an article entitled “Map of Death: Horrible Details about the Creation of Viruses in Ukraine Revealed,” Gazeta.ru — “Declassified documents revealed US spending on biological laboratories in Ukraine.”

But suddenly the “declassified documents” do not contain anything fundamentally new: The Insider has written repeatedly about attempts to pass off the American Biological Threat Reduction Program (BTRP) as the development of biological weapons. Russian propaganda began to spread such fakes long before the full-scale invasion, but after February 2022, publications about a network of Ukrainian laboratories with “biological weapons” allegedly being developed there began to appear especially often. The presented materials only duplicate information that has been known for a long time (and has never been hidden). What is much more interesting is what these files are.

Here is the map that Zakharova writes about.

As you can see, it indicates the biological safety levels of laboratories (Biosafety Levels, BSL). Level 1 laboratories are designed to work with safe or low-hazard microorganisms that do not cause diseases in healthy people. Standard laboratory rules are followed there: hand washing, protective gown, restricted access.

Level 2 is work with moderately dangerous pathogens that can cause diseases that are usually treatable (for example, hepatitis A or salmonellosis). Precautionary measures in such laboratories are more serious: gloves, eye protection, and if there is a risk of aerosol formation, protective cabinets with an internal air flow and filtration system.

Level 3 - work with dangerous pathogens transmitted by airborne droplets and capable of causing severe diseases such as tuberculosis. In such laboratories there is strict access control; work takes place in sealed boxes equipped with a special ventilation system with negative pressure and air filtration.

Finally, level 4 laboratories are designed to work with the most dangerous pathogens, such as the Ebola and Marburg hemorrhagic fever viruses. Precautionary measures include isolated complexes, separate ventilation and decontamination systems, pressurized protective suits with air supply, or work in completely isolated enclosures.

So how many biosafety level 4 laboratories are marked on the map? As you would expect, not a single one. There is one laboratory of the 3rd level in the Odessa region, as well as 3 more laboratories of this level, intended only for working with pathogens of animal diseases, as well as one storage facility of Soviet biological weapons that were not destroyed by the time the map was compiled (in what year it was compiled is unknown, but clearly before 2014, which Zakharova also admits). The remaining facilities belong to level 2, which corresponds to diagnostic laboratories in infectious diseases departments of regular hospitals.

True, next to the map there is a list of areas of work with Ukrainian specialists:

• Storage of Soviet-era biohazardous pathogens

• Training of Ukrainian scientists to work in biosafety conditions in the USA

• Certification “Very dangerous pathogens”

• Repository of biologically dangerous and disease-causing pathogens: anthrax, tularemia, tuberculosis, swine fever, Newcastle disease, Middle East respiratory syndrome, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Marburg fever, Ebola, Lassa, plague, rickettsia, etc.

It is not entirely clear how the mention of pathogens, work with some of which undoubtedly requires the 4th level of biological safety, correlates with a map on which there are no such laboratories.

Some of the information collected in the published files already appeared in the materials that Russia presented at the consultation meeting of states parties to the Biological Weapons Convention (BTWC) in September 2022. At the same time, all accusations against Ukraine were rejected. A press release on the US State Department website states :

“In the presence of delegations from 89 countries, the United States and Ukraine presented a detailed and comprehensive series of reports that convincingly refuted Russia's absurd and false claims about the US development of biological weapons and the existence of biological laboratories in Ukraine.

Technical experts from the U.S. and Ukrainian delegations made clear the nature of their cooperation and U.S. assistance in the areas of public health, biosafety, biodefense, and disease monitoring as part of the broader U.S. Cooperative Threat Reduction Program.

The United States and Ukraine also emphasized that such activities are fully consistent with and further contribute to the provisions of the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC), especially Article X, which encourages cooperation and assistance among States Parties.”

In particular, we are talking about document BWC/CONS/2022/WP.15 , one of the materials that Russia submitted for consultations. It includes data from the Black and Veatch company, officially operating in Ukraine on behalf of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, as evidence of the development of bioweapons. It is from here, judging by the contents of the files, that information about the projects, contractors and scientific institutions appearing in the “declassified” documents is taken.

File from documents presented by Russia at the meeting of the parties to the Biological Weapons Convention (BTWC) in September 2022

The rest of the data is completely publicly available on the website of the US Embassy in Ukraine, including information that the priority of the BTRP program is “consolidating and ensuring the safety of pathogens and toxins that pose a threat, as well as helping Ukraine identify outbreaks of diseases caused by dangerous pathogens,” and the list of laboratories participating in the program with PDF files on them. In particular, a profile was taken from there on the Central Reference Laboratory of the Research Anti-Plague Institute named after I. I. Mechnikov in Odessa.

Profile from declassified documents

Additionally, back in 2020, when Russian state media claimed that the US had “admitted” to the existence of a network of secret Ukrainian laboratories, the US Embassy in Ukraine issued a press release openly announcing that Ukrainian government facilities under the BTRP program were “creating secure storage facilities for pathogens and toxins for peaceful research and vaccine development.” Thus, the very presence of pathogen samples in laboratories is neither new nor ever hidden.

The sheer number of such institutions is not a sensation. The thesis about dozens of laboratories in Ukraine did not appear now and was repeatedly used both by the Russian side and by Gabbard herself. True, then she said that in Ukraine there are “from 25 to 30 biological laboratories financed by the American government,” which are located in the combat zone and, if damaged, “deadly pathogens” can spread from them.

“These pathogens know no borders. If released unintentionally or intentionally, they will quickly spread throughout Europe, the United States and the rest of the world, causing untold suffering and death. Therefore, to protect the American people, the people of Europe, the people around the world, these laboratories must be closed immediately and the pathogens they contain must be destroyed,” she said.

Based on this, Gabbard called on the administration of Joe Biden, who was then US President, to begin negotiations with Russia and Ukraine in order to achieve an immediate ceasefire.

Meanwhile, the US Department of Defense fact sheet for the Cooperative Threat Reduction program directly states the number of funded institutions in Ukraine:

“Since 2005, the United States, through the Biological Threat Reduction Program (BTRP), has invested approximately $200 million in Ukraine, supporting 46 Ukrainian laboratories, medical facilities and diagnostic centers.

BTRP has contributed to improving the level of biosafety, security and epidemiological surveillance in Ukraine, both in the field of human and animal health. By supporting safer and more effective disease detection, this assistance has directly improved Ukraine's ability to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic."

Moreover, Ukraine has never been the only country featured in such statements. Now Gabbard puts the number at more than 120 laboratories in dozens of countries. Two years ago, in February 2024, a similar narrative was spread by Sergei Shoigu, speaking about 330. The Chinese Foreign Ministry repeated this after him, citing the figure as 336 and noting that in his estimates he referred to data “obtained by the Russian military.” At the same time, former State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki called the statement of a Chinese Foreign Ministry representative absurd and repeating Russian conspiracy theories, noting that “it is Russia that has a long and well-documented experience of using chemical weapons, including in attempted murders and poisonings of Putin’s political enemies, such as Alexei Navalny.”

In response to the new round of fakes, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine issued an official statement. Among other things, it says :

Once again we reject baseless accusations and emphasize that Ukraine consistently fulfills its international obligations under the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC). The Ukrainian side has never carried out activities related to the development, production or stockpiling of biological weapons.

Cooperation between Ukraine and the United States in the field of biosecurity has for many years been aimed exclusively at strengthening public health, epidemiological surveillance, laboratory diagnostics, biosafety and biosecurity capabilities. These are normal civilian activities that comply with international health standards and practices and are not associated with any military objectives.

The Ministry of Health of Ukraine made a similar comment, separately explaining statements about the nature of the work of laboratories and the storage of pathogens. The department recalled that the issue of Ukrainian-American cooperation in the biological sphere has already been considered within the framework of the consultative mechanism provided for by the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention in 2022.

As a result of the consultations, Russia’s accusations of developing biological weapons were not confirmed. The same issues were subsequently considered by the UN Security Council, where no evidence was presented of the existence of military biological programs in Ukraine.

The Ministry of Health directly stated:

“Laboratory institutions participating in relevant international technical assistance programs are diagnostic, scientific or reference laboratories of public health, veterinary medicine or other scientific institutions. In principle, they are not intended and could not be used for the development of biological weapons or research aimed at creating pathogens with enhanced dangerous properties.”

Separately, the department drew attention to the fact that:

“The presence of pathogen samples in laboratories is not exceptional or unusual. Such samples are used throughout the world for diagnostics, surveillance, research and response to infectious disease outbreaks. That is why one of the areas of international cooperation was to increase the level of biosafety and physical protection of laboratories.”

Outgoing Tulsi Gabbard has repeatedly echoed Russian propaganda and criticized American policies during her political career. In the early days of the full-scale war in Ukraine, she even said that the war could have been prevented if the United States and the West had recognized that Ukraine's possible entry into NATO was indeed dangerous for Russia. But in the new batch of declassified documents released by her office, there is nothing that would confirm the Kremlin accusations.

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