UK tackles bioweapons threat

UK tackles bioweapons threat

Anthrax scares have raised fears

The government is to review security measures in research labs to stop terrorists gaining access to biological weapons.

The move follows a warning from a committee of MPs that groups could infiltrate universities, as well as commercial and NHS laboratories, in an effort to get hold of deadly agents.

The Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee suggested vetting of students on some courses to weed out potential espionage threats.

Despite assertions by many scientists that British labs are safe, one microbiologist has said some were infiltrated by Iraqi scientists in the run-up to the Gulf War.

The government has announced a review of security arrangements surrounding work with dangerous pathogens and toxins.

The move comes after concern that groups could get hold of or manufacture poisons like ricin or more deadly agents.

At present universities whose research causes the most concern take part in a voluntary controls scheme.

Commercial danger

The scheme does not cover the NHS or wholly commercial laboratories.

In a written reply to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said Britain had made much of the running in tackling the threat from biological weapons.

Measures suggested in a consultative green paper in April last year were accepted by the international community at the Biological Weapons Review Conference in November, the foreign secretary said.

Work into reviewing security arrangements and making them watertight will continue for the next three years.

Concerns about Britain's screening arrangements were highlighted by the discovery that the head of the Iraqi biological weapons programme, Rihab Taba, studied at the University of East Anglia in the 1980s.