There were about 50,000 deaths from chemical agents in the First World War and 7,000 deaths in the Kurdish population of Iraq from mustard gas and nerve agents. Signatories to the 1925 Geneva Protocol forswore first use of chemical warfare, but were allowed to maintain stockpiles, and there were no sanctions against use. The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which entered into force in 1997, establishes timetables for declaration of current and past CW activity and destruction of stocks. The Convention allows inspection of suspect sites. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has been established to give effect to the CWC, which, as of June 1999, has 125 States Parties. Progress in reporting and destroying CW agents is described. It is essential that participation in the CWC becomes universal, but until this is the case monitoring by other agencies will be needed.
Old dogs or new tricks: Chemical warfare at the millennium
Reprints and Corporate Permissions
Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?
To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:
Academic Permissions
Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?
Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:
If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.
Related research
People also read lists articles that other readers of this article have read.
Recommended articles lists articles that we recommend and is powered by our AI driven recommendation engine.
Cited by lists all citing articles based on Crossref citations.
Articles with the Crossref icon will open in a new tab.