Mexico
Practice Relating to Rule 74. Chemical Weapons
Mexico’s IHL Guidelines (2009), in a section entitled “Basic rules of conduct in armed conflict”, states: “Do not use … chemical weapons.”
In 1989, in reply to a note verbale of the UN Secretary-General on the subject of chemical weapons, Mexico declared that it did not possess chemical weapons.
In 1992, during a debate in the First Committee of the UN General Assembly dealing mainly with the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention, the negotiation of which had been concluded by the Conference on Disarmament, Mexico stated that it was very important that the international community was at the point of totally banning a category of weapons which, despite the restrictions on their use, had been used in several conflicts by States party to the 1925 Geneva Gas Protocol. For Mexico, this proved that those countries that possessed these kinds of weapons were really willing to rid the world of these weapons by signing this new international treaty.
At the First Conference of States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997, Mexico stated that it was in favour of global eradication of chemical weapons and stressed the importance of universal adherence to the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention.
In 2008, during the Second Special Session of the Conference of States Parties to Review the Operation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, the permanent representative of Mexico stated:
11. If we were lucid and decisive enough to create the OPCW [Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons], it was because chemical weapons stockpiles do exist and because we were and are convinced that their existence hinders the attainment of general and complete disarmament. Mexico therefore firmly believes that destruction is the condition sine qua non.
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13. Although the immense majority of States Parties does not possess chemical weapons, we are nonetheless committed and decided to contribute to their total elimination, first and foremost, through national implementation measures as stipulated under Article VII of the Convention, specifically through the setting up of the national authorities, and through the drafting and passage of legislation that complies fully with the above mentioned article.
In 2010, at the fifteenth session of the Conference of States Parties to the Convention on Chemical Weapons, the permanent representative of Mexico stated:
[W]e should not forget, not for a single moment, that the destruction of chemical weapons is a standing and unrenounceable obligation and, therefore, the possessor States Parties must complete the destruction of their stockpiles irrespective of the solution we may agree on.