C&EN has learned that the Bush Administration has rejected the latest draft of a verification protocol intended to strengthen the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). The draft, a compromise document nine years in the making, is supported by U.S. allies. Publicly, State Department officials maintain that the draft protocol is still undergoing high-level policy review. But stunned by ally reaction to U.S. withdrawal from the Kyoto protocol on global warming, U.S. officials are searching for a diplomatic way of announcing the rejection, possibly--but not likely--at a multilateral negotiating session this week. More likely, arms control experts think the U.S. will be pressured to make its decision public at the July negotiating session, the last before the BWC review conference in November when negotiators have to report progress. U.S. rejection may not scuttle future protocol efforts but will likely shift them into low gear.

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