May 02  18:19
CHINA URGES JAPAN TO CLEAN UP WORLD WAR II CHEMICAL WEAPONS

Beijing (ANTARA News) - China urged Japan Tuesday to abide by a global treaty on chemical weapons and quickly remove mustard gas bombs and other such weapons which retreating Japanese armies left on Chinese territory at the end of World War II.

"The Chinese Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Defense... urges Japan to quicken the pace of work and completely destroy all the chemical weapons left in China by Japan at an early date," the foreign ministry said in a statement.

The statement, posted on the ministry`s website, came after a delegation from Japan`s parliament visited China`s northern Jilin province and Guangdong province in the south to inspect sites where such weapons were buried.

Japan and China agreed in principle in December last year to jointly establish an organization to dispose of up to 400,000 chemical bombs left by Japanese armies by 2012, according to Japanese press reports.

The agreement was to replace an earlier pact calling for the destruction of the chemical weapons by April 2007. However no formal agreement on the new program has since been announced.

Under the reported December agreement, Japan committed itself to funding an 806-million-dollar bomb disposal facility in Jilin`s Haerbaling district where most of the weapons are located.

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

According to China`s official Xinhua news agency, over 2,000 Chinese citizens have been injured or killed by leftover Japanese chemical munitions.

Under the United Nations Chemical Weapons Convention, Japan is responsible for cleaning up the bombs. It has repeatedly expressed its willingness to do so although technical and diplomatic problems have held up progress.