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Chemical Weapons Agency Bows to U.S. Pressure, Sacks Boss
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| Bustani’s efforts to get Iraq into OPCW upset Washington. |
THE HAGUE, April 23 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - After weeks of an extraordinarily blunt and very public U.S. campaign, the cash-strapped Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons agreed Monday to dismiss its Brazilian chief Jose Bustani.
"The conference of the state parties approved the proposition to dismiss the director general of the OPCW," said the organization’s spokesman Peter Kaiser.
Bustani defied calls to stand down after U.S. officials relentlessly attacked as "disastrous" his management of the agency which oversees a key chemical weapons treaty, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
However, some observers say Bustani upset Washington by his efforts to encourage Iraq to join the U.N.-sponsored Organization because it would have made an American invasion more difficult, according to the British daily newspaper, The Independent.
In a special session called by the United States to decide his fate, 48 member states voted in favor of Bustani's dismissal, while seven were opposed and 43 abstained. There were no immediate details of how voting was managed.
It was Washington's second such campaign in a few days. Last week it brought about the replacement of the head of the UN's climate advisory body, an outspoken critic of America's energy policy.
The U.S. delegation claimed Bustani mismanaged and undermined the credibility of OPCW, established in 1997 to oversee the destruction of chemical weapons. It said that if Iraq joined, any new weapons inspections would be too soft.
America also accused Bustani of threatening inspections in five unspecified countries "for political ends" – an accusation he dismissed, according to The Independent.
An unlikely group of celebrities including British singer Robbie Williams, artist Damien Hirst and television presenter Jonathan Ross signed a letter to a British newspaper this week arguing that Britain should support Bustani.
Amy Smithson, the director of the chemical and biological nonproliferation project at the Henry Stimson Center research organization in Washington, said the vote to remove him had been a "most unfortunate episode," according to the British paper.
Member states are due to spend the next few days discussing Bustani's successor although in the interim, the current deputy John Gee could step in.
The U.S. State Department reacted with glee to the vote, which followed a previous failed attempt to get rid of Bustani last month in a no-confidence vote.
"This decision is an essential first step in restoring stability and sound management to this very important organization," said Lynn Cassel, a department spokeswoman.
Bustani, who has led the agency since 1997, accused the United States of seeking to take control of the organization, which gets a fifth of its funding from Washington.
The OPCW has an annual budget of about 40 million dollars (45 million euros), 22 percent of which is provided by Washington, but is in severe financial straits and now has only enough cash to continue for a matter of weeks.
The organization was created to guarantee implementation of the 1994 Chemical Weapons Convention, which provides for the destruction of the world's chemical weapons within 10 years, starting from April 29, 1997.
Bustani said that among the main accusations against him were his plans to open OPCW membership to Iraq which the U.S. President branded a member of an "axis of evil" that also includes Iran and North Korea.
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