To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on Her Majesty's Government's policy on the biological weapons convention.

We fully support the 1972 biological and toxin weapons convention and believe it represents an important international norm against the development, acquisition and retention of biological and toxin weapons. We hope that measures to strengthen the treaty regime will be agreed at the third review conference in September this year.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proposals Her Majesty's Government will be making to the biological weapons convention review conference to be held in September.

We shall be submitting proposals to strengthen the existing provisions of the biological weapons convention and to maintain its status as an important international norm against biological and toxin weapons. Central to our policy will be proposals to improve and extend the regime of confidence-building measures, to improve organisational arrangements by establishing a supportive body and to examine the feasibility of devising effective verification procedures.