§ Mr. Arnoldasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the answer of 14 March, if he will give details of the new British initiative designed to help the negotiations on a convention to ban chemical weapons; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. HurdSome recent progress towards a convention to ban chemical weapons has been made in the Committee on Disarmament. But the main obstacle to progress on a chemical weapons ban remains the problem of verification. We have proposed in a paper recently presented to the Committee a system of inspection of parts of the civil chemical industry as a means of resolving one aspect of the problem: the need to ensure that chemicals manufacture for civil purposes are not diverted to military use. I will place a copy of my speech to the Committee on Disarmament in Geneva and of the British proposal in the Library of the House.