ЗАБРАНА БИОЛОШКОГ ОРУЖЈА У МЕЂУНАРОДНОМ ХУМАНИТАРНОМ ПРАВУ
PROHIBITION OF BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS IN INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW

Summary/Abstract: Once the military circles became aware that the results of the biological research might be used for warfare purposes, the immediate result was the creation of biological weapons. The effect of biological weapons is based on biological agents or toxins which are spread by special live and tehnical means for the purpose of causing contagious diseases in people, animals or plants. The biological weapons were first specifically prohibited in 1925 by the Geneva Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare. However, the serious drawbacks of the Geneva Protocol were the permission to use biological weapons in non-international armed conflicts and against the non-state parties, and the unlimited possibility of entering reservations. The Biological Weapons Convention was adopted in 1972 as an attempt to deal with these drawbacks. In addition to the use of nuclear weapons, the Convention also prohibited the production, stockpiling, development and transfer of biological weapons, and obliged the signatories (state parties) to destroy the existing stocks of these weapons. This Convention set a good legal framework for the eradication of this kind of mass destruction weapons. However, the major drawback of this Convention was the lack of a reliable mechanism of international supervision and control over the observance of the assumed obligations. All the attempts to strengthen the supervision mechanism have not yielded practical results yet.

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