September 27, 2002	Friday	Rajab 19, 1423

HAMBURG, Sept 26: The United States is secretly developing chemical weapons such as disabling anaesthetics and psychoactive substances in breach of international law, an independent watchdog charged Thursday.

The “non-lethal” weapons being developed by a branch of the Department of Defense are designed for use against civilians or in military, anti-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations, the Sunshine Project said.

The US military is also developing long-range devices to deploy such arms including a mortar round, again in defiance of the Chemical Weapons Convention, according to the non-governmental group based in Austin, Texas and Hamburg, northern Germany.

“We can present hard evidence for an illicit and shameful chemical weapons programme in the US,” Edward Hammond, head of Sunshine Project US, said on its website.

“If the US invades Iraq and uses these weapons, we may witness the depravity of the US waging chemical warfare against Iraq to prevent it from developing chemical weapons.”

The group said the focus of the Pentagon’s Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate was on “calmatives”, which it claimed was a military term for mind-altering or sleep-inducing drugs.

Other agents being developed includes cramp-inducing convulsants and various pharmaceuticals, it alleged.

The group said there was a danger that if people were attacked with a fast incapacitating chemical, they might assume they were under serious threat and retaliate with lethal chemical weapons.

It called for UN inspectors to investigate the US programme.

A chemical weapon works by spreading toxins which are capable of killing or producing permanent or temporary paralysis.

The World Health Organisation lists 17 chemical weapons, with tear gas and other disabling chemicals having the lowest threat classification and nerve gases such as sarin having the highest.—AFP