Chemical Weapons Convention
U.S. Ratification and Implementing Legislation
More than 100 years of international efforts to ban chemical weapons culminated on January 13, 1993, in the signing of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). The convention entered into force April 29, 1997. One hundred ninety of the 192 signatories have ratified the convention. On April 24, 1997, the Senate passed the CWC resolution of ratification by a vote of 74 to 26. President Bill Clinton signed the resolution, and the United States became the seventy-fifth nation to ratify the convention. The CWC bans the development, production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons by member signatories. It also requires the…
