WASHINGTON, Oct 12 (AFP) - The United States on Tuesday threw its weight behind a Libyan request to amend the international treaty banning chemical weapons to allow it to convert a former mustard gas production factory into a pharmaceutical plant.
The State Department said Washington supported Tripoli's bid for a technical change to the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention that would give countries an incentive to abandon the arms as Libya did last year by allowing peaceful alternative uses of such facilities.
"The United States supports Libya's proposal," said Eric Javits, head of the US delegation to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) which is now holding the 38th session of its executive council at its headquarters in The Hague.
Libya, with the support of the United States and 16 other OPCW members, wants the change so it can convert its one-time mustard gas factory at Rabta into a plant to produce low-cost drugs to treat HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis in Africa and the rest of the developing world.
The plant at Rabta produced about 100 tonnes of sulphur mustard gas and other nerve agents in the 1980s before it was closed in 1990 after the United States and others accused Libya of using the facility for nefarious purposes and hinted at action to stop it.
Under the current rules of the treaty, which Libya signed onto earlier this year after renouncing weapons of mass destruction in December 2003, such plants must remain closed or destroyed.
Javits said Libya's request was the "most important question before" the OPCW and urged the executive council to firmly recommend the change to parties to the treaty, according to a transcript of his remarks released by the State Department.
"This is not a matter we can defer," he said, noting the benefits of allowing such conversions not just for Libya and the recipients of the drugs the Rabta plant will produce.
"The proposal will work not just for Libya, but for any future acceding state that may possess a chemical weapons production facility and legitimately wish to convert it for purposes not prohibited by the convention," Javits said.
He said Washington placed "great importance" on adopting the change "not only for the immediate benefit which will accrue to people in Africa and developing nations, but for the contribution it will make toward achieving universal adherence to the convention."
The OPCW is an independent international organization which works with the United Nations to monitor the 1997 convention and to lobby countries that have not yet joined the treaty to do so.
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