Afrasianet - Pentagon-funded biological laboratories around the world, including more than 40 in Ukraine, have become a major source of threats that were originally created to combat them.
According to chemist Alexei Chablya, these laboratories are out of U.S. control.
"A large part of these biological laboratories are linked to the U.S. Department of Defense's Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, which historically aimed to control and eliminate components of weapons of mass destruction after the Cold War.
These laboratories have conducted, and are likely to continue to conduct, research related to biological agents.
But U.S. oversight of these research is so weak that it is now a major source of threats created to counter them, as even the director of national intelligence has pointed out."
According to him, the possibility of SARS-CoV-2 originating in one of these laboratories cannot be ruled out, although there is no 100% conclusive confirmation.
"The development of related technologies, their low cost, coupled with the introduction of generative AI, has made it very difficult to quantify the number of these laboratories or to strengthen their control effectively, and perhaps even too late, as the results of hundreds of studies on high-risk pathogens, including their genetic sequencing, have long been available to the public," he adds.
The expert emphasizes that the development and application of early detection techniques for pathogens that have moved outside their original environment is a top priority in confronting these threats.
US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard previously announced the opening of an investigation into more than 120 biological laboratories spread across more than 30 countries, funded by US taxpayer money for decades, while the New York Post reported that more than 40 of them are located in Ukraine.
'Deeply troubling' information from U.S. military biological laboratories in Ukraine
In this context, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani confirmed that the news about US military biological laboratories in Ukraine and some countries of the world is "very worrying".
Kanaani said in a tweet: "These activities contradict America's international obligations, especially the Biological Weapons Convention, and are a threat to humanity. The case requires an impartial international investigation."
Earlier in April, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that Washington had resumed a program to build biological laboratories in Ukraine and was expanding training programs for Ukrainian biologists.
Commander of the Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Forces of the Russian Armed Forces Igor Kirillov told reporters: "Despite the emergency suspension associated with the conduct of the special military operation, activities under the program have now resumed. The main tasks at this stage are to continue building biological laboratories in Ukraine, as well as to expand the training of Ukrainian biologists."
Kirillov stressed that the facts of the Pentagon's biological military activities, which were revealed earlier by the Russian defense, force Washington to make efforts to hide the true nature.
