The 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) is presently the principal tool against biological warfare. 1 As of December 2004, 153 states have ratified or acceded to the convention and another 16 have signed, but not ratified the convention. It encompasses a comprehensive prohibition of preparation for biological warfare. At the heart of the BTWCis Article I, which specifies that states parties cannot acquire or retain biological weapons (BW)under any circumstances. This prohibition is reinforced by the requirement in Article II to destroy or divert all BW to peaceful uses, and by the on-proliferation provision of Article III. By current standards the BTWC is nevertheless a weak treaty because it lacks verification and enforcement mechanisms. There have been some confirmed cases of material breaches and several other allegations of biological warfare and biological weapon (BW) programmes. These have increased the calls to equip the convention with instruments to verify it and enforce compliance. To date efforts to strengthen the BTWCby means of a supplementary legally-binding protocol have failed and the prospects that negotiation of a formal text could resume any time soon are bleak.

Rapid advances in biotechnology and genetic engineering also challenge the future vitality and relevance of the convention. Parties to the BTWC reaffirm the central prohibition in the light of the technological developments during periodic review conferences. However, the failure of the 5th Review Conference in 2001 and at the resumed session in 2002 means that the scope of the norm has not been updated since the 4th Review Conference in 1996. 2 While current biotechnology can be applied to improve the effectiveness of agents or their production processes, the greater concern regards the types of future weapons they may make possible. 3 In this respect, failure of the 6th Review Conference in 2006 would significantly damage the relevance of the convention.

Progress in the fields of biology and biotechnology also fuel the longstanding controversy regarding the right of states parties under Article X of the BTWC to have access to relevant technologies and to participate in information exchanges. 4 The new technologies offer many prospects for the advancement of human welfare. 5 Developing countries in particular do not view them just as a means to improve the health and food security of their societies; they also actively pursue the establishment of a domestic biotechnological research and industrial base with the aim to leapfrog one of more development stages. At the same time, this natural diffusion of technology feeds into the proliferation fears of many advanced countries as they believe that the greater availability of knowledge, skills and materials increases the likelihood of their application in BW programmes. They refer to the non-proliferation obligation in Article III to justify the implementation of technology controls and the development of a range of technology denial and interdiction strategies as part of their counter-proliferation policies. 6 The different types of security concerns—societal versus military—create diverging expectations from the BTWC.

The controversy is exacerbated by the convention’s inability to verify compliance with its prohibitions. This applies particularly to the recipient’s utilization of the transferred goods. Biotechnology transfers in particular are difficult to monitor. On the one hand, some of the substances—microbial agents or their parts—can be transferred in such small quantities that theygo undetected or unmonitored. On the other hand, relevant technologies are often intangible as they include data, processes and expertise. In addition, much of the equipment and the processes used for the study and production of microbial agents have dual-use characteristics: while they hold out many promises to improve the quality of life, they can also easily be applied for hostile purposes, for instance, to improve the stability and virulence of existing warfare agents or to create new agents based only on some components of an organism. In contrast to other weapons, the final phase during which such technologies with dual-use potential are unequivocally being applied for BWpurposes is virtually non-existent. As a consequence, awareness that a transaction is actually taking place and ascertaining that the transferred technologies are not diverted for purposes prohibited under the BTWC become extremely complex security issues.

An important part of a future verification process will consequently have to focus on keeping technology transfers as transparent as possible (and thereby contribute to the building of confidence). In addition, it is becoming increasingly clear that the security concept can no longer be limited to ‘military security’ alone. It involves several layers such as personal security, economic security (for companies, states, etc.), societal security (including health issues, food and water security), political security (regime survival), environmental security, and so on. The AIDS disaster in some African countries illustrates how these different levels are intertwined. A future technology transfer regime in support of the prevention of the weaponization of disease will have to be designed in such a way that it does not give rise to ethical concerns regarding human welfare.

This paper first discusses the armament dynamic in order to provide insight into how political entities—states as well as non-state actors, such as terrorist or criminal organizations—may structure the programme to acquire BW. The assimilation model identifies, on the one hand, a set of enabling factors that have a major, and in some cases critical, influence on how the BW programme will be set up, and, on the other hand, a set of contextual factors that determine whether the political motivation exists to start up or pursue the programme. In the event such a programme is set up, there remain many hurdles to be crossed before the weapon is assimilated into the mainstream military doctrine.

contents
Introduction
Supply and demand side in technology transfer controls

The demand side in biological armament
Assimilation and its implications
The demand side perspective of the proliferation process
The armament dynamic: overview of the process and its implications
Application of the assimilation model to non-state entities

The armament dynamic and supply-side non-proliferation policies
The ‘dual-use’ concept

Towards an understanding of dual-use technology transfers
The understanding of ‘dual-use’ technology transfers under the BTWC

The organization of transparency

The accreditation process
International organization
Establishing accreditation criteria
Monitoring of transfer flows
Analysis and evaluation
Inspectorate
National implementation assistance

National authority
The generation of transparency
Technology transfer flows
Conclusion
Notes

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