Since the poisoning of Sergei Skripal by Russian intelligence officers as well as the chemical attack by Assad forces in Douma, Moscow has ratcheted up its rhetoric about American biological weapons laboratories in the South Caucasus and Central Asia. By employing such allegations, Russia is sending dangerous signals to the US as a part of its ongoing confrontation with the West.

During a press briefing in Moscow on October 4th 2018, General Major Igor Kirillov, commander of Russia’s radiological, chemical and biological defence troops, stated that as a result of medical experimentation on people, which were conducted by a company belonging to the former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 73 Georgian citizens have been killed. Kirillov claimed that the US has financed biological laboratories in Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan and is continuing to develop biological weapons “under the guise of peaceful research”.