Russian Lt Gen. Igor Kirillov, Commander of the Russian radiological, chemical and biological defense force, announced on March 7 that Russia has seen documents—apparently seized during Russia’s military operations in Ukraine—indicating that work on both anthrax and plague was done in U.S.-funded labs in Ukraine. He further charged that the Kiev government was now attempting to destroy all samples, so as to cover up proof of their violations of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).
Kirillov asserted that there are up to 30 labs in Ukraine that have partnered with the Pentagon’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, among others, and that the assortment and the excessive quantity of the biological agents is indicative of some military biological programs. One such laboratory in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv had destroyed as many as 320 containers with pathogens causing plague, swamp fever and Malta fever (brucellosis) among others.
Ukraine has denied any bioweapons.
