Collaboration with the United Nations and other international organizations.

 

The United Nations is the premier international organization to secure international peace and security. Cooperation between the UN and OPCW has as its foundation the relationship agreement that the two international organizations had already concluded in 2000. The OPCW Conference of the States Parties approved the agreement in May 2001, and it entered into force later that year. It distinguishes five main areas of cooperation. The first three of these are identified in the CWC treaty text itself: paragraph 36 of CWC Article VIII, paragraph 4 of CWC Article XII (both of which concern grave cases of violations of the CWC which shall be reported to the UN), and paragraph 27 of Part XI of the CWC Verification Annex. The latter two would become relevant in the initial investigation of reported CW use in Syria in early 2013, before that country became a state party to the CWC. The remaining two areas identified by the UN-OPCW relationship agreement concern cooperation in the provision of assistance to a CWC state party that has suffered from the threat or actual use of CW and to foster international cooperation for peaceful purposes in the field of chemistry. The UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1540 on April 28, 2004. It provides WMD terrorism-related guidance that is more detailed than the broad-based UN counter terrorism strategy. One observer has summarized it as “mandatory for all United Nations Member States, [that] brings together obligations under numerous single-technology focused treaties and agreements, focusses attention on the activities of non-state actors, and requires Member States to go beyond mere declarations of support for nonproliferation.” The operative paragraphs of the resolution strengthen several of the central norms of the CW prohibition regime, such as the ones on non-acquisition, non-transfer and non-use of CW, albeit with a focus on non-state actors, such as terrorist groups. To implement the resolution, the Security Council established a Committee and a group of experts.164 The UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, adopted by the General Assembly in Resolution 60/288 on September 8, 2006, also refers to the CWC and its implementation. The plan of action annexed to the resolution inter alia calls on the OPCW to continue its capacity building measures for CWC State Parties to prevent terrorists from accessing chemical materials, to improve chemical security at relevant facilities and to respond effectively to chemical attacks by terrorists. Since its adoption, the periodic reviews of the Strategy have expressed an expectation for states to support the treaty-based norms intended to internalize international obligations against terrorist use of weapons of mass destruction and to cooperate and assist in preparing and responding to such terrorist incidents. Practical cooperation between the OPCW and UN in the global fight against terrorism has focused on four areas complementing the OPCW’s stand-alone activities in this area. They can be subsumed under the headings of interagency coordination, legal and policy assistance, preventing CW use by non-state actors, and ensuring an effective response.