According to the biologists, documents presented to the public last week by Russias defense ministry as supposed evidence of covert bioweapons labs under Pentagon control in Ukraine actually describe relatively harmless collections of pathogens used for public health research. This was later to manifest itself as a key feature of the subsequent Biopreparat programme". The goal of this and other Pentagon-funded biological studies in Ukraine was the creation of a mechanism for the covert spread of deadly pathogens., On March 10, Russian defense ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov claimed, falsely, that documents seized in Ukraine indicated that U.S. and Ukrainian researchers were plotting to use birds to covertly send deadly pathogens to Russia pic.twitter.com/83nNA897kc. A total of fourteen highly detailed reports on the Soviet BW programme were issued in the period 1924-1927. The Ministry of Defense made a false, unfounded statement and now, if I talk to people, 90percent of them will say: Bioweapons were made in Ukraine. No one has read the attached documents. Aralsk-7 was part of a. ????????????? The principal architect of the Soviet Union's first military biological programme was Yakov Moiseevich Fishman[ru]. "He's already used. Among his terrifying prophecies for 2021, the 16th century astrologer hinted that Russian scientists would create a biological weapon that will create a virus which turns people into zombies - and will eventually leave us extinct. Scientists warn that humans should be worried about being wiped out by a killer pathogen that is specifically designed to kill people of only a particular race, based on their genetic material/. Tucker Carlson took the bait offered by the Russian militarys reference to coronavirus. Not only did Russia inherit from the USSR the world's largest arsenal of biological weapons, but also all classified databanks on biological warfare program outputs, engineering documentation and manuals providing guidance in biological weapons deployment. The ambassador endorsed a discredited conspiracy theory that the photographs had been staged. This work was allegedly initiated in the 1920s at the Leningrad Military Medical Academy under the control of OGPU (see above). Crucially, Geissler notes that there are no contemporary accounts by the German army or intelligence services regarding the use of F. tularensis as a biological weapon at Stalingrad. I guess we shall see., Russia makes claims of US-backed biological weapon plot at UN, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. What if these labs are creating viruses just like COVID-19?. His decree was, however, not obeyed. Russia claimed to discover U.S.-funded biological weapon facilities in Ukraine this week, an evidence-free allegation the United States quickly denied and cast as another Kremlin attempt . [15], In the Far East the Soviet Union had been subject of a BW attack in 1939 during the battles of Khalkin Gol (Nomonhan) by Japan's Unit 731 under Shir Ishii. [21] The Soviet bioweapon effort became a huge program rivaling its considerable investment in nuclear arms. Imagine you come to a certain office and see an inscription on one of the rooms:Instruction for the cleaner. Nostradamus predicted a zombie apocalypse in 2021, citing a Russian scientist who created a biological weapon that produces a virus that - Turns humans zombies. Representative to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield warned that Russias claim could be a pretext for it launching its own biological weapons attack on Ukraine. Over the next decade or so, dual-use BW production plants were created at Berdsk, Omutninsk, Penza and Kurgan. Five people died from inhaling anthrax and 17 others were infected after exposure in the following months, as envelopes stuffed with spores were mailed to U.S. officials and journalists. Correction: March 21, 2022 In 1930, Velikanov was placed in command of a new facility, the Red Army's Vaccine-Sera Laboratory in Vlasikha, around 30 miles to the west of Moscow. Cook, Michelle Stem and Amy F. Woolf (April 10, 2002). Under Putin, Russia has a biological weapons program, one that it has clearly used to target its opponents. Thomas-Greenfield said: I will say this once: Ukraine does not have a biological weapons program. She went on to turn the accusation back on Moscow. [17] The new military institute later pursued major programmes focused on variola virus and viral haemorrhagic fevers. The Soviet Union covertly operated the world's largest, longest, and most sophisticated biological weapons program, thereby violating its obligations as a party to the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. It has been successful in helping former Soviet and other countries fulfill public health obligations. Photo: Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images. The threat reduction assisted post-Soviet states in containing and destroying the pathogens in Soviet labs. Last week, both the Chinese statement and the Infowars video were promoted on Facebook as paid advertisements. When Steve Rosenberg of the BBC put it to Zakharova in late 2018 that there was no evidence in the documents tracking the Sovaldi project that any biological weapons experiments on humans had been performed in the U.S.-funded lab, the Russian diplomat unwittingly echoed Donald Rumsfelds infamous remarks in 2002 on the lack of evidence for Iraqi WMD, in her reply. [14], By 1939, with the USSR on a war footing, the Soviet leadership is reported to have believed that the "imperialistic and fascistic countries" had actively undertaken BW preparations and that the use of such weapons, in case of emergency, was a foregone conclusion. "The Memoirs of an Inconvenient Man: Revelations About Biological Weapons Research in the Soviet Union" by Igor V. Domaradskij and Wendy Orent, This page was last edited on 24 January 2023, at 00:52. Because it upsets so many people that I talk to constantly, I have introduced a bill to stop taxpayer funding for bioweapons, Greene said. Subcommittee on Intelligence, Emerging Threats and Capabilities. The article claims that Nostradamus, also known as Michel de Nostradame, predicted a Russian scientist would create a biological weapon and produce a virus that would turn humans into zombies, according to one of his prophecies from a book discovered at the National Library in Rome "which is believed to belong to him." [36], As of 2021, the United States "assesses that the Russian Federation (Russia) maintains an offensive BW program and is in violation of its obligation under Articles I and II of the BWC. Those documents were orders from Ukraines health minister, issued on the second day of the Russian invasion, directing labs in two cities, Kharkiv and Poltava, to destroy collections of bacterial pathogens used for research. The anti-corruption activist Alexey Navalny survived an attempted assassination with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok in Russia in 2020. The kind of reporting we do is essential to democracy, but it is not easy, cheap, or profitable. The Biden administration publicly warned Wednesday that Russia might seek to use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine as the White House rejected Russian claims of illegal chemical weapons . [7] The Soviet Union was one, when it deposited its ratification notice. These are invitations to workshops and accompanying material, lists of instructions on biosafety, lists of completely innocent strains [of pathogens], many of them received from Russian collections., As for the stuff on avian and bat migration investigations, routine research on strains of flu and other viruses in the wild population that could jump to humans, Lewitin told me he couldnt comprehend it any other way than as a complete delirium., A parallel effort to evaluate the first set of documents presented as proof of biological weapons research at the labs in Kharkiv and Poltava was conducted by a group of nine Russian-speaking biologists based in Russia, Belarus, Sweden, and France that was published on Twitter in Russian by Olga V. Pettersson, an ex-pat Soviet expert in genome sequencing. The list contains only strains common to microbiological and even more so to epidemiological laboratories.. The visits occurred in January 1991. We were given access to all areas of the site, examined relevant documentation, and interviewed staff, and concluded that the Center demonstrates significant transparency, Lentzosreported in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. About 30 minutes after this article was published on Thursday, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican who appears to also represent the extreme reaches of the internet, introduced Russian disinformation about bioweapons in U.S.-funded labs in Ukraine into the Congressional record. "[24], In 1989 the defector Vladimir Pasechnik convinced the British that the Soviets had genetically engineered a strain of Yersinia pestis to resist antibiotics. In February 1928, Fishman prepared a key report for Kliment Efremovich Voroshilov (the People's Commissar for Military and Navy Affairs and Chairman of the USSR's Revolutionary Military Council) on the Soviet Union's preparedness for biological warfare. Russia has claimed without any evidence that biological weapons are being developed in laboratories in Ukraine with support from the United States. Making their first appearance during the Cold War, survivalists truly believed in an inevitable apocalypse caused by a nuclear war between the U.S. and Soviet Union and attempted to prepare retreats that would enable them to survive the blasts from nuclear bombs. I hope that this is more of a disinformation talking point than an actual thing, Gronvall said. ?? The death records, Kirillov claimed, gave Russian experts, reason to believe that a highly toxic chemical drug or a highly lethal biological agent was [administered] under the guise of medical treatment at the U.S.-funded Lugar Research Center in Tbilisi. The first Russian biologist to make his analysis of the evidence widely known wasEugene Lewitin, who holds advanced degrees in biology from Moscow State University and GosNIIgenetika, a biotechnology research institute. Whatever their expectations, it is beyond doubt that the Russian government has succeeded in generating a global media frenzy of speculative commentary on the supposed existence of bioweapons labs in Ukraine despite the fact that the documents they have pointed to as evidence offer no support for the allegations. ?????? The Zombie Threat Is Very Real!!! The Russian Biological Weapons Program: Vanished or Disappeared? Buildings at the site belonging to a smallpox institute, subordinate to the People's Commissariat of Health, were transferred to the military facility. Biblical famine As well as a deadly zombie virus, Earth apparently 'will be hit with a famine of biblical proportions.' It says material is being destroyed to conceal . The Russian biological weapons program in 2022 By Robert Petersen October 5, 2022 On February 24, Russia launched a war of conquest against Ukraine after it had already illegally annexed Crimea in 2014 and waged war for eight years in the Donbas. (2012). The Russian Federation is known to possess or have possessed three types of weapons of mass destruction: nuclear weapons, biological weapons, and chemical weapons.It is one of the five nuclear-weapon states recognized under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.. Russia possesses a total of 5,977 nuclear warheads as of 2022, the largest stockpile of nuclear warheads in the . Two major Japanese offensive BW installations at Pingfang and Changchun were overrun by the Red Army. At some point around the 25 September, the facility was evacuated and the buildings partially destroyed. The event incited heated discussion. However, General Otoz Yamada, Commander of the Kwantung Army had already ordered the destruction and evacuation of these facilities. The development was conducted in Vector Institute under the leadership of Dr. Ustinov who was accidentally killed by the virus. ? She also pointed out that she receives no U.S. funding for her research on genomic sequencing. [citation needed]. The Russian permanent representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, delivered a lengthy account of the alleged biological weapons plot, and said the birds, bats and insects supposedly intended. With recent advances in gene editing, it may be possible for bioterrorists to design viruses capable of altering our behaviour, spreading such a disease and ultimately killing us. German intelligence independently identified the secret BW programme allegedly managed by Zlatogorov and Maslakovets. Spearheaded by the Vector State Research Centre of. Russia to Witness 'Zombie' Anthrax Outbreak? Nulands comments were seized upon by far-right commentators as evidence of a secret plot. No. The U.N. Security Council met at Russia's request to discuss Russia's claim of U.S.-supported chemical and biological weapons labs in Ukraine. (Most of that long thread was translated into English by Ilya Lozovsky, an editor at the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. J Miller, S Engelberg, and W Broad (2001). Unit 68240 of Vladimir. He said there was no chance that the U.S.-funded labs were performing any work on biological weapons. ???????????? His back is against the wall, said Biden, mentioning the false claims about US-funded biolabs in Ukraine. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, "biological weapons, also called germ weapons, are any number of disease-producing agents, such as bacteria, viruses, rickettsiae, fungi, toxins, or other biological agents, that may be utilized as weapons against humans, animals, or plants." 1 Throughout history, pathogens have proven to be the most "Dead through spite, he will cause the others to shine." "Few young people: half-dead to give a start," Nostradamus mentioned in his writing. Alibek maintains that "Soviet leaders from Leonid Brezhnev to Mikhail Gorbachev personally authorized prohibited development, testing, and production efforts [and] cites several Gorbachev decrees stepping up the pace of work within the biological weapons complex, and directing the creation of mobile production facilities so that inspectors could not uncover the program. In fact, US funding to the laboratories had its roots in the fall of the Soviet Union, after which money was pumped into Ukraine and other countries to help them transfer scientific skills away from weapons towards public health. It breeds and spreads among birds, but on rare occasion, it can infect . The aim of the project is and was to enable the country to do diagnoses on antibodies itself. The institute added that its project is part of the German governments effort to improve global biosecurity through the minimization of biological risks emanating from highly hazardous pathogens in 25 countries., Konashenkov, the defense ministry spokesperson, also claimed that the documents from Ukraine showed that certain experiments were carried out with samples of coronavirus in bats. The World Health Organization (WHO) has said it is unaware of activity by Ukraine violating any international treaty, including the ban on biological weapons. The first group to arrive from Kirov included the new director of the Institute of Hygiene, Major General Nikolai Fillipovich Kopylov. And weapons developed in secret Soviet labs are still used to poison Russian dissidents and defectors.