RI told to speed up the implementation of CWC
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesia, a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), must speed up the establishment of a permanent national authority and the passage of a "unified robust national legislation" on the use of chemical substances in order to fully implement the convention, a seminar heard on Wednesday.
Participants of the seminar on the Implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention in Jakarta urged the government to take immediate steps to implement fully the CWC in Indonesia.
The CWC is an international treaty that bans the use of chemical weapons and aims to eliminate chemical weapons throughout the world.
Since Indonesia ratified the convention in 1998, the government has been moving at a snail's pace to implement the convention. Under the CWC, every member country must make the convention part of their national legislation before November 2005.
Anny Sulaswatty, a participant of the seminar from the Research Center for Chemistry at the Indonesian Institute of Science (RCChem - LIPI), warned the government about the possibility of terrorists making chemical weapons (CWs), the materials for which were readily available.
"CW agents are relatively easy to make, especially because their precursors are abundantly available in local markets," Anny told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of the seminar.
"Considering the occurrence of the recent bombings, it is not impossible that, in their next action, the terrorists may fill the bombs with toxic chemicals," she said.
Seminar participants -- diplomats, Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Technical Secretariat members Sergei Kisselev, Lisa Tabassi and T. Juurlink, and executives of the local chemical industry -- expressed hope the current national authority on chemical substances could help raise awareness among industry members of their obligations under the convention.
The two-day seminar, which ended on Wednesday, was organized by the Indonesian foreign ministry in collaboration with the Technical Secretariat of the OPCW.
The seminar reviewed the relevant requirements to be included in new legislation. It also suggested the new law should cover areas like prohibitions and penalties, the extraterritorial application of the law to Indonesians, a definition of chemical weapons and toxic chemicals, and purposes not prohibited under the legislation.
The participants also emphasized that the legislation should enable the national authorities to conduct of smooth national and OPCW inspection on local industries.
The Hague-based OPCW is an independent international organization that was established in 1997 by the countries that have joined the CWC, to ensure the convention works effectively and achieves its purpose.
Indonesia organized its first ever OPCW inspection in January 2004 at PT Petrokimia Gresik in East Java.