Russia To Analyze Relations With OPCW After Organization's Mandate Expansion - Lavrov

MINSK (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st November, 2018) Russia will analyze its current relations with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) following the decision to vest the organization's Technical Secretariat with additional functions to establish those guilty of chemical attacks, however, Moscow will not make hasty conclusions, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday.

"Of course, now we have to review the current situation, analyze our further relations with the OPCW ... I do not think we should draw any hasty conclusions. Now we need to soberly look on how and whether it is possible to save the most important tool of international law for the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction - the Chemical Weapons Convention," Lavrov said at a meeting with his Belarusian counterpart.

On Tuesday, the Conference of the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) approved the expanded OPCW budget for 2019 paving the way for the global chemical weapons watchdog to gain additional powers to assign responsibility for chemical attacks. The conference also rejected the amendments proposed by Russia and Iran to the draft program and budget.