Japan to build weapon disposal center in Jilin
(crienglish.com)
Updated: 2005-06-06 16:02

Japan will spend more than 200 billion yen, or 1.9 billion US dollars, building a chemical weapons disposal center in China to process Japanese weapons left there after World War II.

The Nihon Keizai newspaper said the chemical weapons recovery and disposal facilities will be built in the Haerbaling district of Jilin province, where most of Japan's abandoned chemical weapons are believed to be buried.

It said that the project is expected to be the largest overseas endeavor ever to be undertaken by the Japanese government. The cost of the project may increase further if the disposal process takes longer than expected.

The newspaper said Japan and China will sign a special accord this summer on the initiative.

It added that the accord is expected to allow foreign companies that are not eligible to take part in large-scale projects under Chinese law to work on the disposal as long as they receive approval from the Japanese government.

The Japanese government is expected to conduct an international bidding process for selecting construction companies for the project within the year.

Japan estimates its forces abandoned more than 700,000 chemical weapons in China during the war, although Chinese experts say as many as two million exist -- the world's largest stockpile of abandoned chemical arms.

Some 90 percent of abandoned chemical weapons, including mustard gas, a highly poisonous blistering agent, are buried in Haerbaling and experts fear chemical agents from the weapons may have polluted the soil in the area.