Vietnam: What substances are included in chemical weapons?

According to the Decree No. 38/2014/ND-CP of Vietnam’s Government, chemical weapons include one, two or all of these:

- The toxic chemicals and their precursors, except for the ones used for the purposes which are not prohibited in the CWC with the quantity and types conformable with those purposes.

- Munitions and equipment that are specially designed to use the toxicity of the toxic chemicals and precursors as prescribed in Clause 1 of Article in order to cause death or other evils.

- Any equipment that is specially designed to directly use the munitions and equipment prescribed in Clause 2 of this Article.

In which:

- “Toxic chemical” means any chemical which through its chemical action on life processes can cause death, temporary incapacitation, acute or chronic poisoning in the long term to humans or animals; or damage to environment and habitat. This term includes all such chemicals, regardless of their origin or of their method of production, and production facilities.

- “Precursor” means any chemical reactant which takes part at any stage in the production by whatever method of a toxic chemical. A precursor participates in the chemical reaction that produces a toxic chemical and plays the key role in term of the toxicity of that toxic chemical.

- “Schedule chemical” means any toxic chemical and precursor governed by the CWC and is classified as Schedule 1 chemical, Schedule 2 chemical (including 2A*; 2A and 2B) and Schedule 3 chemical according to the decrease of the toxicity level.

- “Other chemical” mean any chemical not listed in a Schedule which is classified as DOC and DOC-PSF, of which:

+ DOC means any chemical belonging to the class of chemical compounds consisting of all compounds of carbon except for its oxides, sulfides and metal carbonates.

+ DOC-PSF means any unscheduled discrete organic chemical containing one or more elements phosphorus, sulfur or fluorine.

View more details at the Decree No. 38/2014/ND-CP of Vietnam’s Government, effective from July 01, 2014.

Le Hai

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