A day after India gained entry in the Australia Group, which seeks prevention of proliferation of chemical and biological weapons (CBW) through exports, Prime Minister Narendra Modi thanked member countries for supporting India’s candidature. He said that India's memberships of such groupings reaffirms its strong non-proliferation credentials and commitment to global peace and security.
"I thank Australia and other members of the Australia Group for export control for supporting India's entry in it. Over the last two years, India's membership of Missile Technology Control Regime, Wassenaar Arrangement and Australia Group reaffirms India's strong non-proliferation credentials and also our commitment to global peace and security," Modi said on Twitter.
India, on Friday became the 43rd member was the Australia Group, an informal forum of countries which, through the harmonisation of export controls, seeks to ensure that exports do not contribute to the development of chemical or biological weapons.
"Coordination of national export control measures assists Australia Group participants to fulfil their obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention to the fullest extent possible," the AG website said.
The group in its meeting June last year noted, "with grave concern and regret, evidence and allegations of chemical weapons use in the Syrian Arab Republic as well as in the Republic of Iraq."
The AG participants called for immediate cease of all such use of chemical weapons. "The 4 April 2017 incident in the Khan Sheikhun area of southern Idlib in Syria is deeply disturbing. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Fact Finding Mission has confirmed the use of sarin, a nerve agent, at the 4 April incident. This is just one in a continuing series of chemical weapons use on which the OPCW has reported. As well, the OPCW-UN Joint Investigative Mechanism in 2016 concluded there was sufficient information that several chemical weapons attacks in Syria were caused by both the Syrian Arab Armed Forces, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the levant (ISIl) ," it said in a statement after the meeting.
It added that the reported use of the nerve agent VX as a chemical weapon in the assassination of Kim Jong-nam at the Kuala lumpur International Airport on 13 February 2017 was an unlawful act that endangered innocent lives and represents a clear threat to international security interests. "The development and use of chemical weapons by any actor is unacceptable, and the perpetrators of this act must be held responsible," the AG noted with concern.
The other members of the AG are: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, European Union, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, latvia, lithuania, luxembourg, Malta, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Republic of Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom and United States.