Don’t allow terrorists acquire chemical weapons

Kenya and the rest of the world should scale up efforts to prevent terrorist groups in the region and across the globe from acquiring and using dangerous chemical and biological weapons.

This unique threat has acquired more urgency after the recent attack on an Iraqi city of Taza, North of the capital Baghdad, by ISIS using lethal chemical weapons, specifically mustard gas. This is believed to be the first time a militant group is deploying such a deadly weapon in their attacks.

The poison gas attack, which left scores dead and many injured, represents a devastating new development in which terrorist groups acquire and use terrible chemical and biological weapons in their indiscriminate attacks on civilian populations.

The harrowing pictures of the victims of the attacks reveal in graphic and terrible details, the consequences of destructive weapons in the wrong hands.

If no urgent action is taken by the global security infrastructure to prevent further proliferation of chemical and biological weapons to terrorist groups, the technology may be rapidly shared with other militant groups around the globe including Boko Haram in West Africa and Al-Shabaab in East Africa.

Local and international security experts have indicated that terrorist groups operating in different parts of the world often share information, manpower and technology.

There is also no doubt that such groups have always been on a determined hunt for deadly chemical and biological weapons in order to enhance their capabilities to kill a significantly higher number of people than they have been able to do in the past.

Terrorist groups have previously carried out deadly attacks, including in Kenya and other countries in Middle East, Europe and North America, leaving hundreds of people dead.

It is unimaginably scary to think of the number of lives and property they could easily destroy if they lay their hands on more chemical weapons.

The ISIS attack against the innocent Iraqi civilians especially women, children and the elderly, proves to the International community the grave danger that the terrorist groups pose when chemical weapons are in their possession. They certainly won’t think twice about using them

Mustard gas is considered as one of the banned chemical weapons by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

But terrorist groups don’t respect or uphold international laws and regulations forbidding the use of such dangerous chemicals against civilian populations.

According to the Iraqi Embassy in Nairobi, Baghdad has officially informed the United Nations through the Security Council and the OPWC, as well as all ambassadors who are accredited in Baghdad, about this horrific attack by

ISIS, in order to warn all countries about the growing threat of chemical weapons in the hands of terrorist groups.

The communication also stressed the urgent need of all countries to intensify their cooperation in the global fight against terrorists groups by preventing from acquiring chemical and biological weapons.

The attack by ISIS serves as a warning that by having such chemical weapons and using them against Iraqi civilians, terrorist groups will not hesitate to use them against other innocent people of other countries of the world, if given the chance.

It appears that previous efforts to prevent the proliferation of such deadly weapons have fallen short since ISIS appear to have already acquired them, even if it is not the entire range of such weapons.

It is not yet clear how they did so but it is suspected that they acquired them from smugglers in the thriving multi-billion underground black-market of weapons.

Therefore, what is urgently needed now is to prevent ISIS and other militant groups from acquiring other deadly biological and chemical weapons and sharing them with similar groups across the globe.

This can be done through enhanced intelligence-sharing and smashing the smuggling rings that are largely responsible for underground and lucrative weapons proliferation.

There is no need to wait until terrorist groups use such terrible chemical weapons in western capitals before international action acquires the urgency it deserves. The fact that they used it in an Iraqi city makes the whole world so much more vulnerable to similar attacks.

Recently, the Kenya government announced moves to tighten security in the chemical and biological labs of the Kenya Medical Research Institute to prevent them from reaching the hands of terrorists groups. That is a welcome move that should inspire more action in that direction.