South Korea and the United States will establish a set of new rules to regulate the U.S. Forces Korea's shipment of biochemical samples into the Northeast Asian ally, the Defense Ministry said Thursday.
This follows the U.S. delivery of what could have been a live anthrax sample to USFK's biochemical laboratory inside Osan Air Base in April.
The Pentagon announced the next month that the sample, initially labeled "inactivated," was one of many possibly live anthrax samples that the U.S. Army's Edgewood Chemical Biological Center accidentally shipped to laboratories inside and outside of the U.S. due to a deficient inactivation process.
Since the announcement, a joint working group of the allies' defense ministries looked into whether the anthrax sample was properly handled in South Korea, and how similar cases can be prevented, before unveiling the result Thursday.
According to the findings, USFK has brought in a total of 16 anthrax samples since 2009, including the April shipment, as part of its bio-defense tests in South Korea.
In April, one sample of the Y. pestis bacterium was also brought in, according to findings based on USFK records submitted to the South Korean side of the joint group.
The number of shipments is much more than what USFK initially told South Korea in May when they said only one anthrax sample was shipped here.
The April shipment was not screened locally because South Korean customs authorities are not legally allowed to look into inbound USFK biochemical samples labeled "inactivated."
In a bid to prevent similar incidents, however, the joint group mapped out a set of guidelines on USFK's future shipment of biochemical samples, the ministry said in a statement.
Under the guidelines, USFK is required to report the name, amount and purpose of any biochemical samples that they are trying to bring into the country as well as the sending and receiving organizations of the samples.
If one of the two sides wants to look into a sample, they will jointly do so, according to the guidelines.
The joint group will put the guidelines up for official signing during the allies' biannual joint committee meeting of SOFA, or the South Korea-U.S. Status of Forces Agreement, set to start at 1:00 p.m.
The recent joint probe concluded that the April shipments of anthrax and pestis samples were aimed at testing USFK's bio-defense program JUPITR's capacity to detect the toxic substance and training USFK forces with the program.
"The results showed USFK did not have any intention to bring in activated anthrax or pestis samples," Army Maj. Gen. Jang Kyung-soo, the South Korean head of the joint group, said in efforts to allay any public skepticism over the delivery.
He also said that the April samples did not incur any safety risks, saying that the samples are packed and delivered in a way permitted under the international standards on the substance.
Some of the samples were used for JUPITR testing in May and the rest destroyed in a technically safe manner, he said.
"There were no elements that could pose harm to the human body," Song Ki-Jun, microbiology professor at Korea University who observed the probe, said, referring to USFK's handling of the samples.
"Anthrax spores are hardly infectious under a laboratory environment," the professor said.
A total of 22 U.S. forces and defense staff members were vaccinated after coming into contact with the samples, but none of them have shown any symptoms of infection so far. (Yonhap)