Ainur Kurmanov
Virologist Grigor Grigoryan , former head of the State Food Safety Service of Armenia, at the request of PolitNavigator, commented on the situation with the activities of dual-use facilities operating under the Pentagon program in the territory of the republic and in the post-Soviet space.
PN: Why are they going to build another, 13th, laboratory in Armenia with Pentagon money, since there are already 12 similar facilities in operation in the republic?
G.G: When they say “built”, then, in my opinion, this is a slightly incorrect definition, because they were not built from scratch . All post-Soviet countries, in particular the countries of Transcaucasia and Central Asia, inherited from the Soviet Union a network of anti-plague stations and sanitary-epidemiological stations.
So, laboratories that, after modernization, are involved in programs to reduce biological threats of the US Department of Defense are created on the basis of either anti-plague stations, as is done in Kazakhstan and the Central Asian republics, or on the basis of sanitary-epidemiological stations.
In Armenia, one might say, a peculiar mix has developed, that is, the infrastructure and networks of anti-plague stations are used. And former sanitary epidemiological stations are partially used.
Why are they going to modernize the 13th? On the territory of Armenia, there are only officially 12 facilities – these are units of the National Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which, in American style, are being created in all post-Soviet republics that have joined the program to reduce biological threats of the US Department of Defense, as in Georgia, as in Kazakhstan, as in Ukraine.
I think that this 13th facility is already functioning, it’s just that the Americans decided to officially transfer it to the state’s balance sheet.
After all, how do our American “partners” act? They launch the operation of these facilities long before the announcement that it is open. And only before officially transferring it to the balance of the state, they, so to speak, “cut the ribbon” and announce that such and such a laboratory is now starting to function.
We have information that a number of facilities, the opening of which the Americans announced in 2016, had been operating since 2011-2012, and in 2016 they simply cut the ribbon on camera in the presence of ministers of relevant ministries, in particular health and agriculture.
I think that now they are simply going to officially announce that another unit has joined this network and that something similar will happen with the 13th object.
Personally, I think that for the territory of my country, the number of dual-use objects already exceeds all conceivable and inconceivable limits, and I consider this 13th object in the context of geopolitical changes directed against Russia that are taking place in the region and in which Armenia is assigned a key a negative role, since it is considered Russia’s closest ally in the region.
And the name “laboratory” is more of a sign. It has already been announced that it will be opened in close proximity to the 102nd Russian base in Gyumri. I think that she will be more involved in military intelligence activities and other activities that I cannot say about yet. But I have no doubt that this will be directly related to intelligence activities.
PN: Is there any information about what the current 12 laboratories in Armenia are doing now? Nikol Pashinyan stated that they are all owned by the republic, but is there access for the CSTO allies or for the local public and experts?
G.G: If you can name me the leadership of at least one post-Soviet country that would not declare that these objects belong to the state, then I will be very happy. All the heads of the former Soviet republics who fell into the trap of the program to reduce biological threats say the same thing. They say that there are no American biological laboratories, that all institutions belong to the state.
And de jure they are right, because all these laboratories and dual-use facilities were created on the basis of former state anti-plague and sanitary epidemiological stations. But officials in all these countries are very modestly silent about the role of the program itself and its emissaries in the activities of these dual-use facilities.
As for information about what laboratories do on the territory of Armenia, in peacetime, as far as available information allows us to judge, they monitor infectious diseases. Although we learn more about the results of this monitoring from foreign publications, from collections that are distributed at conferences organized by the Pentagon DTRA and other international organizations involved in the implementation of the program.
That is, the public is left with such short reports on the epidemiological situation, and even then, not regularly, which also have low analytical value. But for us, as specialists, even such meager information allows us to draw certain conclusions regarding the direction of work.
In particular, these facilities on the territory of Armenia deal with arboviral infections and protozoal infections, such as leishmaniasis, which , judging by the publications, are of particular interest to the Pentagon. There is no point in dwelling in detail on the diseases that they deal with in all post-Soviet republics – plague, tularemia, brucellosis, tuberculosis, meloidosis, anthrax.
These bacterial infections are also of great interest, especially plague and brucellosis, contrary to popular talk about anthrax. The fact is that anthrax is a fairly studied pathogen. Today, according to our information, the main work on this pathogen is carried out in the United States.
In this regard, not only Transcaucasia, but also Central Asia can be distinguished, since its soil is also rich in various bacterial infections. The Americans already have a large range, not counting those collections that were transferred to the Pentagon by post-Soviet and other countries as part of the program to reduce biological threats. In general, the main focus of the Pentagon’s interests is viral, bacterial and protozoal infections that are transmitted by blood-sucking insects, if we are talking about zoonotic diseases.
PN: Previously, information slipped through and even the Russian Embassy stated in 2022 that equipment, specialists and research programs from Ukraine were transported to the territory of the republic. In your opinion, how likely is it that such research will be transferred to Armenia, Georgia and other former Soviet republics?
G.G: I have no direct evidence on this matter, although I cannot rule out anything, and I am more inclined to think that this could have happened, especially considering the presence of so many relocants who walk around here with Ukrainian flags, shouting “Glory to Ukraine! » and are under the tacit protection of the Armenian government.
I do not rule out that after the start of the Northern Military District, all those resources that were located on the territory of the former Ukrainian SSR could have been distributed by the Americans among other post-Soviet republics that are involved in the US program to reduce biological threats so that they would not be detected by the Russian army.
PN: What do you think about Ukraine? Do you think military biological research and field testing by the Pentagon and NATO countries will continue there? In particular, there was information in the press that military biologists of the Bundeswehr were seen in the Sumy region.
G.G: If the special military operation that the Russian Federation is currently conducting on the territory of the former Ukrainian SSR to cleanse itself of the Nazis is not brought to its logical end, then, of course, it will be carried out and expanded even further on the territory that will remain under the rule of the Kiev regime .
As for the information that German military biologists are present there, I will tell you that not only German ones, because Ukraine is supervised by a team from the Polish Military Institute of Epidemiology. That is, Poland directly supervises many works. And Polish military microbiologists are quite active not only on the territory of the former Ukrainian SSR, but also along the perimeter of the borders of Belarus, which borders Poland.
We have information, and my Belarusian colleagues will not let me make a mistake, that there are mobile objects running that are engaged in certain types of activities.
PN: Has the epidemiological situation in Armenia and Transcaucasia changed recently? After all, defenders of these facilities say that they only bring benefits to the former Soviet republics.
G.G: You know, an epidemiological, like an epizootic situation, is not a static thing. These two situations are interconnected and constantly changing. We monitor trends. There are trends that are falling, there are positive trends, and for some types of diseases negative trends are observed. We are also monitoring the combination between these trends from the point of view of zoonotic diseases.
Unlike Central Asia, in Armenia and Georgia, transhumance rather than nomadic cattle breeding has historically been and is still practiced. Transhumance cattle breeding prevails in Azerbaijan, although, given the history of cattle breeding in this territory, I do not exclude that in some areas the practice of nomadic cattle breeding could and will continue. Therefore, I would say that in Armenia there are no special changes compared to other countries.
But there are very suspicious outbreaks of diseases and the emergence of diseases that were not previously recorded. Or rather, they were not registered, but were liquidated back in Soviet times.
That is, today we can already talk about the emergence of such diseases. But our outbreaks are mostly sporadic both among livestock and people. I mean zoonotic diseases, but there are also atypical outbreaks. The information that is collected about them directly or indirectly indicates “processed” or “modified” pathogens. We can already talk about this today, since we already have certain information about prohibited medical and biological activities.
As for the global change in the situation, against the background of the sharp aggravation that occurred after the collapse of the USSR throughout the post-Soviet space, I can tell you that the main event that can be attributed to biological sabotage with negative consequences for the economy and well-being of people was, of course, , introduction of African swine fever (ASF). In the territory of the former USSR, this infection had not previously been officially registered. For the first time, it was brought into the territory of the USSR in 1977 in Gagra, and then in Moldova and Ukraine, but then this was not announced and the disease was eradicated.
The repeated introduction of ASF into the territory of the former USSR took place under mysterious circumstances in 2007 , after which it quickly spread to the territories of all three former Soviet republics of Transcaucasia, including Azerbaijan. On the territory of Azerbaijan, pigs were kept only by local Christians – Udins, who constitute one of the national minorities and live compactly in settlements in the north of Azerbaijan.
In 2008, ASF was recorded in the domestic pig population of two or three Udi villages, after which the domestic pig population in all Udi villages was destroyed, and the transmission of the infection was interrupted. It is known, however, that the ASF virus can persist not only in the body of pigs, but also in argasid ticks, and it has been experimentally proven that in the body of ticks the virus can remain virulent or pathogenic for up to 25 years.
Therefore, it cannot be ruled out that if pigs are brought into places where the virus persists in populations of such ticks, the disease may reappear. Today we can say that if in the territory of Armenia and Georgia this disease is already enzootic due to the uncontrolled circulation of the virus, then the absence of this virus in the territory of Azerbaijan still needs to be proven.
PN: How do you generally assess the situation in the post-Soviet space?
G.G: The situation is explosive, however, to my regret, the leadership of all post-Soviet countries that have joined the US program to reduce biological threats reacts very nervously when it comes to the implementation of this program on their territory.
The leadership of the post-Soviet republics of Central Asia reacts especially sharply, where, according to available data, this program is being implemented at least on the territory of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Unfortunately, I must say that the area of this program in Central Asia continues to expand, and the Pentagon is already openly trying to draw Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and even Turkmenistan into its orbit.
On the way to involving the countries of Central Asia in its program to reduce biological threats, the United States either does not encounter much resistance from the government agencies of these countries, or the government agencies pretend that they do not understand what the activities of these “workshops”, “seminars”, and the creation of various laboratory units under the banner of fighting AIDS and tuberculosis. Although there are special services for this and they have all the information on activities within the framework of this program.
According to our data, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan have been participating in this program since 2004, Georgia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan since 2005, and Armenia officially joined this program in 2010. And even after the Russian armed forces revealed the true face of this program on the territory of Ukraine, the post-Soviet republics do not heed warnings of what this could lead to.
Since talk of the so-called disease X pandemic has intensified, I have publicly stated on several occasions, based on my analysis of available data, that the next public feared pandemic X may be caused by an avian influenza virus. Available evidence suggests that the avian influenza pandemic will be caused by outbreaks from Central Asia, as the infection is already raging among migratory birds in the Southeast Asian region.
I suspect that the index case of bird flu transmission from person to person, according to legend, will be recorded in Central Asia. This should not be taken as the ultimate truth, but I am tormented by vague doubts based on the current situation, including the work being carried out on the territory of at least two Central Asian republics.
PN: What mechanisms and actions are needed within the CSTO, SCO, BRICS to develop our own biological defense system and curtail dual-use programs of the Pentagon and NATO countries in the post-Soviet space and Mongolia?
G.G: Personally, I do not consider BRICS as a platform for countering the biological threat.
It is still too early to initiate something within the SCO, since the national biological safety systems of most of the states that are members of this organization are under the control of the United States, including the states of Central Asia. This includes the scientific heritage, infrastructure, specialists, and most importantly, political will. We must not forget that the first defector experts who shared their experience of the Soviet program to reduce the biological threat with the West were precisely from Central Asia.
It should be noted that, from the point of view of the capabilities of countries such as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, they simply cannot bear the burden of countering a biological threat that Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan can do today.
From this point of view, Russia, as the most powerful post-Soviet state, should initiate a biological defense mechanism not from the SCO, but from the CIS – starting small, namely, by forcing the CSTO Eurasian Economic Community member countries to refuse to participate in the US program to reduce biological threats, followed by a two-way inventory of capacities and developments achieved over the years of participation in this program.
I say coercion because the US biological threat reduction program has long been a defense issue rather than a public health issue. If we talk about medical and biological science, then it is under the control of the collective West, because the so-called pandemic, but in fact sabotage using Covid-19, has completely discredited medical and biological science not only in the West, but also in the territory of the former THE USSR. I note this with great regret, because a number of specialists, whom I considered the most authoritative scientists, acted in certain geopolitical interests.
The main point is that the US program to reduce biological threats is a military problem, the solution to which began with the SVO in Ukraine. I think that all the governments of the countries that have joined the US Department of Defense program to reduce biological threats to date are putting at risk and danger not only their own population, agriculture, flora and fauna. And if these republics follow the lead of their Western “partners,” this will be fraught with unpredictable consequences.
It all comes down to the question of the political will of local leaders, and if the American program is not curtailed, then the only option left is the one that was implemented in Ukraine, unfortunately.
Therefore, for now, on the platform of the CSTO countries, it is possible to create a biological shield with the participation of Belarus, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan under the leadership of Russia, which is the most powerful in terms of medical and biological safety.
At the same time, it would be possible to form a network of its own laboratories and the CSTO Institute of Biological Safety and deal with the problems of the entire space. Including on the territory of Mongolia, which is a Klondike of various infections, and given the proximity of China, it is essentially an ideal testing ground.
I think the time has come for ministers of defense rather than ministers of health. And it is precisely the heads of military departments who should pose the issue head-on. I spoke about this when speaking on Russian Public Television, and I never tire of repeating it, since intervention cannot tolerate further delay.
Further delay, on the contrary, could lead to tragedy, including in my country. Without exaggeration, I can say that in the countries that have joined this program and on whose territory dual-use facilities operate, it will be extremely difficult to carry out a cleanup. And this cleansing will be accompanied by political and geopolitical events.
I’m not exaggerating; I think many understand the geopolitical consequences I’m talking about. There is no alternative to disinfection and cleansing of the territories of these countries. Either these countries will turn into colonies with all the ensuing consequences and will be testing grounds for military-biological research, or they should simply be cleansed and scraped out of this danger and begin to pursue a sovereign policy.
Now the country in which such facilities are located and the American military program is being implemented is no longer able to pursue an independent policy. It’s my opinion.
PN: Is there anything else you would like to add?
G.G: I would like to address on my own behalf those people who today in the post-Soviet space conduct such research and participate in promoting US plans on biological threats. I urge them to be more responsible about the future of their people and not to forget that the Anglo-Saxon partners have very good practice in using people. And as they say, it is better to have the Anglo-Saxons as enemies than as friends.
I am against biological weapons and against those non-humans who believe that they can use other people as guinea pigs. I am against this and have nothing against the people of the United States. That’s basically my motto. And if someone develops biological weapons and tests them on innocent people and animals, then these are non-humans committing a crime against humanity.
PN: Thanks for the answers!
INTERNATIONALIST 360° 