Ambassador Fernando Arias, Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), and H.E. Ambassador Ms Lisa Helfand, Permanent Representative of Canada to the OPCW
THE HAGUE, Netherlands—31 May 2022—The Government of Canada has made an additional contribution of more than €1,830,000 to support the work of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). The voluntary contribution was announced today by the Permanent Representative of Canada to the OPCW, H.E. Ambassador Ms Lisa Helfand, at a ceremony attended by the OPCW Director-General, Ambassador Fernando Arias, and the OPCW Deputy Director-General, Ambassador Odette Melono.
Ambassador Helfand stated: “Canada remains an advocate for the Chemical Weapons Convention. The OPCW must be equipped to ensure no one will ever again be armed or killed in a chemical weapons attack.”
From the contribution, over €1,110,000 will be provided to the OPCW Trust Fund for Security and Business Continuity. The funding will be used to enhance the security resilience of the Organisation, which is essential for the continued implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC).
An allocation of more than €610,000 will be used to support assistance and protection capacity-building programmes through the Trust Fund for the Implementation of Article X (assistance and protection against chemical weapons). It will specifically support enhanced chemical incident response capacities through the ‘CHEMEX Africa’ programme and to provide training for African customs institutions involved in monitoring the import and export of toxic chemicals.
The Trust Fund for Syria Missions received an allocation of over €100,000 that will support chemical forensics through chemical profiling.
The Director-General remarked: “I am grateful for Canada’s steadfast support of the OPCW and appreciate their voluntary contributions enormously. This support will enable the Organisation to bolster its operational security and to move forward with essential projects to uphold the Convention.”
Background
Canada has been an active member of the OPCW since the Chemical Weapons Convention entered into force in 1997. Canada is a member of the Executive Council, the OPCW’s executive organ, which is charged with promoting the effective implementation of and compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention as well as supervising the activities of the Organisation’s Technical Secretariat.
As the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention, the OPCW, with its 193 Member States, oversees the global endeavour to permanently eliminate chemical weapons. Since the Convention’s entry into force in 1997, it is the most successful disarmament treaty eliminating an entire class of weapons of mass destruction.
Over 99% of all declared chemical weapon stockpiles have been destroyed under OPCW verification. For its extensive efforts in eliminating chemical weapons, the OPCW received the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize.