The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) has made significant strides since its inception. It evolved from the Geneva Protocol 1925, which fell short due to its inability to suggest disarmament of the existing chemical weapon stockpiles. The convention has also clarified the grey area of ‘a ban just on the no first use’ of chemical weapons of a state, which states had perceived as a tacit permission to use in retaliation. Despite facing various challenges to meet its goal of global chemical weapons disarmament, the 2023 became a glorious chapter in its history when the parties destroyed nearly 72,304 metric tons of declared global chemical stockpile and achieved 97 percent disarmament of the existing global chemical weapons stockpile. Despite the milestones CWC has achieved, the emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has exposed numerous regulatory gaps, necessitating the need for updated safeguards.
The CWC was jointly formed by 200 states to prevent the chemical weapons attacks, which have caused millions of casualties over the past fifty years. Among other distinctive features of CWC, besides its universality, the convention comprehensively outlawed the development, acquisition, and retention of any chemical and their precursors unless permitted for peaceful purposes by the convention. Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) accompanies a comprehensive verification regime through scrupulous measures which enforce the convention.
In contemporary times, while the emergence of AI technologies has improved the enforcement and surveillance of the convention, it has also posed unprecedented threats to its customary nature. Experts warn that the modern sophisticated technologies have the potential to reverse the progress CWC has made. A research study performed by a Swiss institute alarmingly revealed that with the help of AI, actors can generate hundreds and thousands of novel formulas for chemical weapon fabrication. For instance, the Large Language Model (LLM) can generate unforeseen chemical weapons which are unpredictable to the chemical forensics or the watchlists of the chemical weapons nonproliferation regime. AI-enabled quick data processing not only provides actors with access to baseline knowledge but also elucidates the fabrication and deployment of chemical weapons without prior knowledge. Besides, these AI technologies have also diversified the ways for actors to access the chemical weapons market through deceptive emails and capitalize on the technical hiatuses of the chemical safety and security infrastructure.
Worse, the CWC contains several loopholes making it vulnerable to the emergence of AI. The static nature of the convention struggles to mitigate the threats posed by AI. Technically, the global chemical weapons supply chain encompasses the early stage of the chemical weapons’ raw material acquisition, manufacturing and then the final stage. While the CWC focuses more on the chemical weapons disarmament, it ignores the global chemical weapons supply chain, which may now be heavily exploited by AI. For instance, AI technologies such as High Throughput Screening (HTS) can rapidly create and replicate novel molecules for chemical weapons. An actor with minimal knowledge of chemistry can gain significant acquaintance about the manufacturing of chemical weapons and bypass the ambiguous policies of the CWC about the dual use of chemicals. To mitigate this threat, the supply chain capacity building principal 3 of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1540 can be beneficial.
The world of algorithms also contradicts the chemical weapons production facility size defined in the CWC. Article 8 (a)(I) assumes a chemical manufacturing facility is peaceful if its yield generation does not exceed 1-ton. Meanwhile, AI diminishes the significance of this threshold because AI-generated chemical weapons formulas can yield results in multiple small-sized AI data centers scattered across a country, while staying under the radar of 1-ton threshold of suspicious chemical diversions.
In addition, the rise of AI manifests the inability of CWC to aid regarding safe and practical use of chemicals. The CWC has inherited profound gaps in the accurate determination of the chemicals for peaceful purposes. As stated in the Article 9 (a), the convention allows the use of chemicals for a permitted ‘purpose.’ However, it struggles to categorize the dual-use chemicals and with the advent of AI, and the possibility of generation of hundreds of novel chemicals generation, the line gets blurred further.
There is an urgency to shift the global narrative on safety and security of chemicals. Global stringent measures for the nuclear safety and security regime can serve as an ideal example. While Chemical accidents are more frequent than the nuclear ones, they are often less catastrophic and receive less attention. As per the estimates, between 2009-2018, around 65,000 casualties happened due to the safety issues at the chemical facilities, underscoring the need to prioritize safety concerns and implementation of comprehensive safety standards across the globe.
From a security perspective, the loopholes within the existing chemical weapons nonproliferation and disarmament regime were exposed by the uncertainty surrounding chemical weapons decommissioning after the fall of Assad’s regime in Syria. In the absence of a solid mechanism for the chemical facilities’ non-attack, there emerged a threat of mass contamination due to bombing carried out by the belligerents in the Syrian conflict. Experts have also raised concerns that the possible destruction of those sites negatively impacts the chemical weapon accountability proliferation and usage accountability measures.
The OPCW should expand the integration of artificial intelligence in its chemical forensics to stay ahead of the potential danger that AI can pose. Integration can improve the processing of extensive tracking data and ensure real-time compliance with the convention by improving its end-user control policies. Previously, the issues with the undeclared chemical stockpile due to noncompliance and nonadherence were a challenge. Now, the millions of novel chemical agents create even greater uncertainty. To tackle this, the OPCW should leverage the innovative potential of AI and deepen international collaboration in this regard.
About Author
Anam Murad Khan is a researcher at the Center for International Strategic Studies (CISS), Islamabad.
