Russia to Open Chemical Weapons Destruction Plant
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:32 a.m. ET
MOSCOW (AP) -- The bland buildings in western Siberia contain shelf after shelf of nerve-gas shells -- some 2 million in all.
Each could kill tens of thousands of people, if exploded in a tightly packed area. Many are small enough to be spirited away in a briefcase.
Since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union left Russia's military underfunded and disorganized, the arsenal in Shchuchye, about 1,600 kilometers (1,000 miles) east of Moscow, has been a top security concern. After years of delays and disputes, a vast facility to destroy the weapons is to formally open there on Friday.
The plant, the size of a small town, was built with a U.S. contribution of more than $1 billion and is seen as a milestone in cooperation on disarmament between Washington and Moscow.
(More here)
Filed at 11:32 a.m. ET
MOSCOW (AP) -- The bland buildings in western Siberia contain shelf after shelf of nerve-gas shells -- some 2 million in all.
Each could kill tens of thousands of people, if exploded in a tightly packed area. Many are small enough to be spirited away in a briefcase.
Since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union left Russia's military underfunded and disorganized, the arsenal in Shchuchye, about 1,600 kilometers (1,000 miles) east of Moscow, has been a top security concern. After years of delays and disputes, a vast facility to destroy the weapons is to formally open there on Friday.
The plant, the size of a small town, was built with a U.S. contribution of more than $1 billion and is seen as a milestone in cooperation on disarmament between Washington and Moscow.
(More here)
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