GENEVA: Russia will not use biological weapons, a senior Russian diplomat said on Friday, amid concerns that Moscow's invasion of Ukraine is increasing the risk of weapons of mass destruction being used.
Konstantin Vorontsov, the deputy head of the Russian foreign ministry's Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control, insisted Russia unleashing biological weapons was "not an issue at all".
Moscow, he told reporters, was "fully and totally committed to its obligations" under international treaties banning the use of biological and chemical weapons and bacteriological agents.
"We do not have any programmes in the military sphere related to biological weapons," he said.
"All our activities in the biological sphere are totally for peaceful purposes and not more than that."
Vorontsov was speaking on the sidelines of the three-week Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) review conference in Geneva, which was due to wrap up later on Friday.
He said questions raised about the threat of such weapons from Russia were merely aimed at shifting the focus away from what he claimed was "the real problem" -- allegedly nefarious United States activity in Ukraine.
UN rejects Russia call for biological weapons probe
Since Russia's full-scale war in Ukraine began in late February, Moscow has repeatedly accused Washington of being involved in the alleged development of biological weapons in Ukraine.
In October, it called in vain on the United Nations Security Council to investigate its accusations.
The allegations, flatly rejected by Washington and Kyiv, resurfaced during the BWC review conference, and Russian ambassador Gennady Gatilov told reporters Moscow had no plans to drop the issue.
"We view it as a threat to our national security," he said, charging that the US was militarily involved in "secret laboratories... not only in Ukraine but in many, many other countries... along the borders of the Russian Federation".
Asked about what evidence Russia had, Gatilov said that "in the context of the Russian special military operation in Ukraine... thousands of documents were taken (that) very openly show that there was secret... military activities in these laboratories".
"We are not just talking about this. We know facts."
He said Russia had presented the documents and asked specific questions, but "we never heard relevant answers on the part of the United States or Ukraine to our questions".
During the review conference, Gatilov said Russia had again pushed for the establishment of "an effective verification mechanism" to be added to the BWC.
Moscow maintains this would make it possible to determine if state parties were violating the convention.
Gatilov lamented at the opening of the conference last month that the measure had been "unjustifiably blocked" since 2001 by the United States.
There were low expectations of concrete decisions at the conference but Gatilov voiced hope the parties would agree to set up a working group on strengthening the BWC.