#ChemicalWeapons #BiologicalWeapons #OSINT #Disinformation #Verification Evidence Poisoning: The OSINT Crisis Nobody Is Ready For (by @dutch_osintguy) the-trench.org/evidence-pois… Over the past decade and a half, we have been confronted with chemical warfare, assassination operations involving nerve agents and lethal animal toxins, and accusations of illicit biological research activities, all indicative of serious breaches of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC). The incidents were accompanied by information warfare, typically of the type in which one side claimed the allegations were fake and the other side argued their veracity. A characteristic of this information warfare is that the same antagonists – government outlets, organisations and institutions, individual scientists or academics, and motley groups of loosely connected activists – may switch between accusing and defending roles depending on the incident. Yet the same protagonists spread disinformation, while the same challengers counter the disinformation onslaught with facts. Too often, the context in which the claims are made is poisoned. Conditioning information elements have been planted in advance, not infrequently years before a particular incident, and help make certain arguments plausible. And in international forums, the truth is all too often political, despite the presentation of facts obtained through internationally negotiated investigative protocols and grounded in the most advanced scientific insights and forensic evidence. In today’s security environment, every individual should ‘know’ instead of ‘believe’ and ‘think’ instead of just ‘being told’ to be able to make informed judgements. The piece below offers a detailed toolbox for analysts to construct credible arguments with minimal ambiguity and for readers to analyse controversial debates critically. Originally published by Nico Dekens (NL) on his excellent blog covering open-source intelligence (OSINT) analysis in May, we reproduce it here with his permission.

#Plague #Russia #Verification #Investigation #WHO #PandemicAgreement Plague risks in Russia and a dangerous delay on WHO pandemic agreement theguardian.com/science/2026… [...] The pathogen access and benefit-sharing annexe to the World Health Organization pandemic agreement is the same argument in modern dress, and it has stalled on the same point. Poorer countries are asked to detect and share dangerous pathogens quickly. In return, they want a binding guarantee of what follows: 20% of real-time production of vaccines and treatments, half donated and half sold at cost. In article 13, the global supply chain and logistics network provides for a more equitable distribution of personal protective equipment. Richer countries prefer all that sharing to stay voluntary. The agreement cannot open for signature until this is settled, and it has now been deferred to 2027. All pandemics start with a rumour. The next pandemic is likely to be something we have never seen before, and whoever first holds the samples will not be us. If we cannot agree what they get in return, we should not be surprised when they are slow to hand them over. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #Biosecurity #ArtificialIntelligence #UK #Laboratory UK Commits £100M to AI Biosecurity Lab With OpenAI, Anthropic aiweekly.co/alerts/uk-commit… [...] AI minister Kanishka Narayan described the lab as 'a major new global institution bringing together world-leading scientific expertise' to protect people from emerging biological threats. OpenAI's share is up to £100 million in compute and model credits, together with trusted access to its most capable relevant models through its Rosalind Biodefense programme. Anthropic has committed up to £100 million in model credits, trusted model access and dedicated technical support. Google DeepMind scientists and Basecamp Research, a life-sciences firm, will partner on research collaborations and AI-biology models. Around the lab sits £120 million for the AI Security Institute and £130 million to strengthen national cybersecurity through AI, with a separate £65 million for developing countermeasures to new pathogens. Initial delivery is framed around early detection of biological threats and accelerating the development of vaccines, treatments and other medical countermeasures; no deliverable timeline or governance structure was announced. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #Biosecurity #ArtificialIntelligence #UK #Laboratory UK to invest £100m in 'world first' AI Biosecurity Lab bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqdj… [...] As part of Wednesday's Budget, the government will commit £100m to establishing the new, "world first" institute with the support of leading AI firms. The chancellor will also pledge millions of pounds in spending across a range of initiatives aimed at shoring up the UK's ability to respond to evolving cyber, biological and AI-enabled threats. "AI will transform daily life: every firm, community, hospital, school, and every aspect of our economy can benefit," John Healey said. "I understand and share the concerns of working people, so I am setting out a distinctively British approach to AI. "One that doesn't leave workers behind and defends our national interest, while ensuring the benefits of AI-enabled growth are felt right across the country." The full details about the role and remit of the new lab are yet to emerge.

#BiologicalWeapons #ArtificialIntelligence #GainOfFunction #India #Legislation The machine in the lab: India’s WMD law has an AI-shaped gap news9live.com/opinion-analys… [...] The emergence of LLMs with systemic capabilities has made access to GOFR easier for ordinary citizens, threatening to undo the progress India has made in regulating WMD under UNSCR 1540. An independent technical expert committee to evaluate AI Models in pre-deployment tests can disclose underlying risks and strengthen cybersecurity safeguards against manipulation by harmful actors seeking high-value information. Legislators should also establish a national policy framework to regulate AI and biosecurity, consisting of experts from the National Medical Commission (NMC) and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), whose suggestions should be reviewed and, if necessary, implemented by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. GPAI systems should strengthen existing safeguards, including registration requirements, by expanding the ‘Know Your Customer’ (KYC) standard to identify malevolent actors with access to hazardous information. [...]

#ChemicalWeapons #OPCW #Budget #USA Chemical Security Is National Security lawfaremedia.org/article/che… [...] The ability of the OPCW to handle its existing high-stakes missions in Syria and Ukraine, or to take on new missions in Sudan or Iran, is being put at risk by the United States’ overdue payments. Over the summer, the OPCW’s independent financial advisory board warned that these missing payments have placed the organization in a “precarious” financial situation and it now faces the “unprecedented circumstance” of having to cancel or postpone routine activities, including inspections and verification missions. These are strong words from otherwise mild-mannered accountants. By October, Dallafior reported that “we are more than 75 percent of the way through the year, but we have received less than 65 percent of assessed contributions for 2026.” To offset this budget crunch, the organization has instituted a de facto hiring freeze, exhausted its operational reserve fund, and begun diverting money from an auxiliary account to fund operating expenses. It is possible that U.S. officials are under the mistaken impression that they can continue to fund OPCW’s activities in Syria and Ukraine through voluntary contributions to the dedicated trust funds that exist for both countries. This is not practical. These trust funds supplement, but do not replace, funds from the regular budget. More important than the size of the trust funds for Syria and Ukraine is that they cover only some of the direct operational costs that the OPCW incurs. The OPCW’s activities in Syria and Ukraine rely heavily on overhead support provided by different components of the OPCW that are paid for out of the regular budget. [...]

#Disinformation #Russia #USA #EuropeanUnion #Countermeasures State Department missteps on countering Russian propaganda washingtontimes.com/news/202… Earlier this month, the start of one of the largest international assemblies dedicated to the critical task of countering Russian hybrid warfare and propaganda was abruptly overshadowed by last-minute opposition from a faction within the U.S. government. In a surprising turn of events, elements within the Trump administration — which successfully pressured officials from Canada, Lithuania, and the European External Action Service to withdraw their support for DISINFO2026, an international summit on disinformation — opposed a provocative scheduled panel on the uncomfortable question of whether the United States itself has become a source of disinformation. DISINFO2026, held Oct. 7 and 8 in Vilnius, Lithuania, was designed as a platform for international experts to collaborate and exchange research to combat the sophisticated tactics Russia uses in information warfare. [...]

#ChemicalWeapons #BiologicalWeapons #Ketamine Defense Department makes a $41M play to get more ketamine on the battlefield to treat pain subscriber.politicopro.com/a… A government effort to get troops in combat quick pain relief has the Trump administration betting millions on a foreign drug company with a domestic manufacturing partner that doesn’t yet have the Nevada state license it needs to operate, a POLITICO investigation found. The Department of Defense awarded a $41 million non-competitive contract in February to Singapore-based iX Biopharma, which has spent more than a decade testing a wafer made with ketamine to treat pain. Ketamine — typically injected into the muscle or the bloodstream — has been a first-line treatment in combat care for severe pain since 2012, and its usage by military medics has since eclipsed that of opioids like fentanyl. Manufacturers of certain oral fentanyl medicines the military used stopped production in 2024 amid low commercial demand and stringent regulatory barriers, prompting the Pentagon to seek alternatives. On Sept. 3, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a declaration allowing the emergency use of drugs — under the same authority he sharply criticized as an anti-vaccine activist during the Covid-19 pandemic — to address “unmet military operations-related medical need for use to manage moderate to severe acute pain in casualties.” Days later, iX Biopharma announced plans to complete its emergency use authorization, or EUA, filing by the end of the year, aiming to get its product, dubbed Wafermine, to U.S. combat troops by 2027. [...]

#ChemicalWeapons #BiologicalWeapons #Use #Accountability How #CivilSociety Can Help Unlock More Universal and Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Cases justsecurity.org/161544/civi… [...] Universal and extraterritorial jurisdiction cases have been a key element of accountability efforts around the globe, and expanding State capacity and will to pursue such cases, while important, will also take time. In the meantime and in parallel, if civil society organizations are looking to what they can do tomorrow, one solution is clear: By providing national authorities with more specific, corroborated, and detailed evidence – evaluated through a prosecutorial lens – civil society will empower national authorities to increase their investigations and prosecutions of atrocity crimes on behalf of victims and survivors.

#ChemicalWeapons #BiologicalWeapons #Ketamine The Pentagon wants ketamine wafers as a battlefield medicine option defensenews.com/pentagon/202… [...] According to the notice, on July 15, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth determined “a military emergency, or significant potential for a military emergency, involving a heightened risk to U.S. military forces of an attack with a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear agent or agents,” or an attack with agents that would cause life-threatening injuries. The declaration continues: “Injuries arising from these attacks may cause those forces to experience moderate to severe acute pain and place them at risk of developing life-threatening hemodynamic instability, including shock or respiratory distress.” Because of Hegseth’s determination, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy, Jr. declared that “circumstances exist justifying the authorization of emergency use of drugs” identified by the Pentagon. [...]

#ChemicalWeapons #OPCW #Budget #USA Washington Reportedly Limits Funding to Key WMD Verification Agencies fdd.org/analysis/washington-… [...] However, at the OPCW’s October 2026 Executive Council meeting, Director-General Sabrina Dallafior warned that unpaid contributions are already affecting operations: the OPCW has fully drawn down its emergency Working Capital Fund, and core activities — including Syria deployments and technical assistance — may soon be curtailed. Damascus is actively cooperating on the elimination of the former Assad regime’s chemical weapons program, which has required sustained and extra-budgetary funding. In July 2026, the OPCW’s advisory body on financial and administrative matters described the organization’s liquidity as “precarious.” [...] Congress should also press the administration to complete the review and restore full OPCW and IAEA funding before essential verification and elimination efforts are curtailed.

#ChemicalWeapons #Sudan #Allegation #USA #UNGA Sudanese Army Faces New UN Scrutiny Over Chemical Weapon Allegations english.globalarabnetwork.co… [...] The inclusion of Sudan in this specific category of international concern reflects mounting pressure on the Sudanese government to address reports of war crimes and violations of international humanitarian law. As the conflict continues to destabilize the nation, the international community, through platforms such as the United Nations, is increasingly scrutinizing the methods employed by the various actors involved in the fighting. For the Sudanese authorities, these accusations represent a significant diplomatic challenge. The comparison to Iran—a country long subject to intense international monitoring and sanctions regarding its military programs—suggests that the allegations regarding chemical weapons are being treated with high priority by Western powers. The development is likely to influence future sessions at the UN, where member states are under pressure to investigate the validity of these claims and consider the potential for further international action. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #Plague #Russia #Transparency #DiseaseSurveillance Irkutsk and the plague: A death exposes how much global health runs on trust lowyinstitute.org/the-interp… [...] A lack of transparency is a serious limit of global disease surveillance, because all countries are dependent on one another to volunteer information. While Russia has legal obligations to share information with the WHO, there are no enforcement mechanisms. That’s probably why the US attempted shirtfronting was so unsuccessful. On 6 October, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio asked for more information (Opens in new window) and said that the US had measures available to help Russia. Rospotrebnadzor, the Russian agency responsible for public health, made a counter statement, offering to “assist the US in combating infectious disease outbreaks (Opens in new window)”. Given the enormous increase between 2025 (Opens in new window)and (Opens in new window) 2026 in measles cases (Opens in new window) across the United States, a more cooperative approach could benefit everyone. But cooperation requires trust which is based on transparency. We need to know about measles - or plague - cases first. [...]

#ChemicalWeapons #Poisoning #HybridOperations #UkraineRussiaWar Teen girl accused of helping Russia kill Ukrainian soldiers with poison cbsnews.com/news/teen-girl-a… [...] The girl, who was not named, is suspected of having packaged deadly drugs and sending them to Ukrainian soldiers she contacted by Telegram, police said in a statement. She was arrested by police in Zhytomyr, west of Kyiv, after allegedly following instructions from a Russian handler in exchange for at least 5,000 hryvnias ($111), they said. After receiving packages with "free drugs," the soldiers were "instructed to take them on camera," the statement said. "The recipients did not know that the capsules contained a lethal dose of methadone," it said, adding that "two soldiers died from poisoning in the Zhytomyr region." Police said they had identified other recipients of the packages, which "prevented four more murders" across the country. [...]

Suggesting there is somehow a brighter #BiologicalWeapons future? ...

#BiologicalWeapons #Biodefence #Strategy #USA #ArtificialIntelligence Army Biodefense Strategy 2026 armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_p… [PDF file] The 2026 Army Biodefense Strategy (ABDS) provides a comprehensive framework to address how the Army maintains operational dominance in a biologically contested environment comprised of naturally occurring, accidental, and deliberate biological threats and hazards. It directs a whole-of- Army effort to integrate biodefense as a core component of warfighting readiness. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #Biodefence #Strategy #USA #ArtificialIntelligence Army turning to AI in its fight against biological threats defensescoop.com/2026/10/12/… The Army is moving to combine environmental, clinical, logistics, chemical, biological and intelligence data with artificial intelligence to identify unseen and emerging disease outbreaks before they can spread widely or harm the force. Senior officials who developed the 2026 Army Biodefense Strategy discussed their new approach to operationalizing security measures against biological threats during a media roundtable Monday at the annual AUSA conference. “There’s a lot of data involved in doing bio-surveillance and sort of figuring out when that threat rears its head early enough to do something about it. And so, we are looking very heavily toward how we leverage AI to help us integrate and sort through that data,” Dr. Alison Tamasi told DefenseScoop. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #Plague #History #Transparency Scientist's death raises troubling plague questions theargus.co.uk/news/26654671… [...] Russia said Shipilova had immunity to the dangerous infections she worked with, which suggests she had been vaccinated. If she did die of plague, that raises uncomfortable questions, about the possibility that Russia may have been developing a strain that evaded protection, a potential bioweapon. There again it could be about laboratory safety. Some experts have suggested both, and they are right to ask for evidence and full disclosure from Russia. That, in the end, is the lesson of the long history of plague. The disease is fearsome, but ignorance and secrecy have always made it worse. There is no sign that Siberia is facing a new Black Death. But a young scientist is dead, and her family and the rest of us deserve a straight answer about why. The bacterium has been beaten back, though not beaten. What keeps it in check is medicine, transparency and honesty.

#ChemicalWeapons #Threat #Technology #Countermeasures #UK AI and Drones Could Make Chemical Weapons Easier to Use, US Official Warns in London fish4news.co.uk/ai-drones-ch… International defence and scientific experts have gathered in London to examine emerging chemical weapons threats, with warnings that artificial intelligence, automated manufacturing and drone technology could make dangerous weapons more accessible. [...] The central warning from London is that the technology used to prevent and investigate chemical weapons threats must continue to develop as rapidly as the threats themselves.

#ChemicalWeapons #Allegation #Sudan #Denial Sudan Rejects Allegations Regarding the Use of Chemical Weapons sudanhorizon.com/sudan-rejec… Sudan has reiterated its categorical rejection of allegations leveled by United States concerning the use of chemical weapons. Speaking before the First Committee of the United Nations General Assembly, the representative of the Sudanese mission in New York, Minister Plenipotentiary Faisal Abdel-Adheem Salem, pointed out that the United States has refused to share the evidence it claims to possess with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), and has also declined to dispatch a technical team to conduct a joint investigation into these allegations. [...]

#BiologicalWeapons #ArtificialIntelligence #SyntheticBiology #Legislation #USA Anthropic wants us to be able to pull the plug on an AI that would kill 50 people korben.info/en/anthropic-wan… [...] In detail, a model would be classified as posing catastrophic risk if it can help build a biological weapon, carry out a cyberattack, or escape the control of its own creator, with more than 50 deaths or serious injuries, or more than a billion dollars in damages, as the result. Nothing less. These thresholds are lifted word for word from SB 53, the AI law California signed last year, and whose definition of catastrophic risk Anthropic was already recommending to lawmakers across the country. As for the mechanics, independent evaluators registered with the US Department of Commerce would test the models, and labs would have 72 hours to notify the department if a threshold is exceeded. A block could then only be ordered by a federal judge in Washington, never by a government agency alone. Except, here's the catch: those famous independent evaluators could be paid directly by the very labs they're supposed to oversee, as long as their pay doesn't depend on the outcome. We've seen more reassuring safeguards. [...]