WW1 toxic compound sprayed on Georgian protesters, BBC evidence suggests

Georgia’s authorities used a World Warfare One-era chemical weapon to quell anti-government protesters final 12 months, proof gathered by the BBC suggests.

“You can really feel [the water] burning,” one of many protesters stated of water cannon turned on him and others on the streets of the capital Tbilisi. A sensation, he stated, which couldn’t instantly be washed off.

Demonstrators towards the Georgian authorities’s suspension of its European Union accession bid have complained of different signs too – shortness of breath, coughing, and vomiting that lasted for weeks.

The BBC World Service has spoken to chemical weapons specialists, whistleblowers from Georgia’s riot police, and docs, and located the proof factors to the usage of an agent that the French navy named “camite”.

The Georgian authorities stated our investigation findings have been “absurd” and the police had acted legally in response to the “unlawful actions of brutal criminals”.

Camite was deployed by France towards Germany throughout World Warfare One. There’s little documentation of its subsequent use, however it’s believed to have been taken out of circulation in some unspecified time in the future within the Thirties, due to considerations about its long-lasting results. CS fuel – also known as “tear fuel” – was used as a substitute.

Konstantine Chakhunashvili was a kind of who gathered outdoors Georgia’s parliament in Tbilisi in the course of the first week of protests – which started on 28 November 2024. Demonstrators have been incensed by the ruling celebration’s announcement that it was pausing EU accession talks. The aim of EU membership is enshrined in Georgia’s structure.

Georgia’s police responded with a wide range of riot-control measures together with the usage of water cannon, pepper spray and CS fuel.

Dr Chakhunashvili, a paediatrician who was amongst these sprayed by the cannons, and who has taken half in lots of the demonstrations, stated his pores and skin felt prefer it was burning for days, and the feeling could not be washed away. In actual fact, he stated, “it was worse when making an attempt to clean it off”.

Dr Chakhunashvili needed to search out out if others had suffered related results. So he appealed, through social media, for these additionally focused by crowd management measures in the course of the first week of the demonstrations to fill out a survey. Practically 350 individuals obtained in contact, and nearly half stated that they had suffered a number of side-effects for greater than 30 days.

These long-term signs ranged from complications, to fatigue, coughs, shortness of breath and vomiting.

His examine has since been peer reviewed and has been accepted for publication by Toxicology Experiences, a global journal.

Sixty-nine of these surveyed by Dr Chakhunashvili have been additionally examined by him and located to have “considerably greater prevalence of abnormalities” within the electrical alerts within the coronary heart.

Dr Chakhunashvili’s report echoed the conclusion that native journalists, docs, and civil rights organisations had come to – that the water cannon will need to have been laced with a chemical. They’d known as on the federal government to determine what had been used, however the Ministry of Inner Affairs – liable for the police – refused.

A number of high-level whistleblowers linked to the Particular Duties Division – the official identify of Georgia’s riot police – helped the BBC decide this chemical’s doubtless id.

A former head of weaponry on the division, Lasha Shergelashvili, believes it’s the identical compound he was requested to check to be used in water cannon in 2009.

The consequences of that product, he says, have been not like something he had beforehand skilled. He discovered it tough to breathe after standing near the place it had been sprayed, and he and the 15-20 colleagues who examined it with him couldn’t simply wash it off.

“We observed that the impact was not carrying off, as is the case for [regular] tear fuel. Even after we washed our faces with water, after which with a particular answer of baking soda and water, which was ready upfront, we nonetheless could not breathe freely.”

Mr Shergelashvili says that because of his assessments, he really helpful towards the chemical’s use. However he says the water cannon autos have been nonetheless loaded with it – and that this remained the case at the least up till 2022, when he stop his job and left the nation.

Talking from his new dwelling in Ukraine, he tells the BBC that when watching footage of the protests final 12 months, he instantly suspected that demonstrators have been being subjected to the identical chemical.

Colleagues he has remained in contact with, and who’re nonetheless in put up, have additionally informed him that is the case, he provides.

And the BBC spoke to a different former high-level police officer who confirmed that no matter was loaded into the water cannon autos when Mr Shergelashvili was in place was the identical compound deployed within the protests of November-December 2024.

• Viewers within the UK can see extra on World Eye at 19:00, 1 December on BBC Two
• Exterior the UK, watch the movie on BBC World Service YouTube

When Mr Shergelashvili was requested if the product he examined might have simply been CS fuel – which irritates the eyes, pores and skin and respiratory system, however solely quickly – he stated it gave the impression to be far stronger than that.

“I can’t identify an instance or evaluate it with something [else],” he stated, including it was “most likely 10 instances” stronger than extra typical riot-control brokers.

“For instance, should you spill this chemical on the bottom, you will not be capable of keep in that space for the following two to 3 days, even should you wash it off with water.”

Mr Shergelashvili doesn’t know the identify of the chemical he was requested to check.

However the BBC managed to acquire a replica of the stock of the Particular Duties Division, dated December 2019.

We found it contained two unnamed chemical substances. These have been merely listed as “Chemical liquid UN1710” and “Chemical powder UN3439”, together with directions for a way they need to be blended.

We needed to examine whether or not this stock was genuine, so we confirmed it to a different former high-ranking police officer from the riot police who confirmed it appeared real. He recognized the 2 unnamed chemical substances as these more likely to have been added into the water cannon.

Our subsequent step was to work out what these chemical substances have been.

UN1710 was simple to determine as that is the code for trichloroethylene (TCE), a solvent that allows different chemical substances to dissolve in water. We then needed to work out which chemical it was serving to to dissolve.

UN3439 was a lot tougher to determine as a result of it’s an umbrella code for an entire vary of commercial chemical substances, all of that are hazardous.

The one one among these we discovered to have ever been used as a riot-control agent is bromobenzyl cyanide, also referred to as camite, developed by the Allies to be used in World Warfare One.

We requested Prof Christopher Holstege, a world main toxicology and chemical weapons skilled, to evaluate whether or not our proof pointed to camite being the doubtless agent used.

Based mostly on the outcomes of Dr Chakhunashvili’s examine, sufferer testimony, the riot police stock, and Mr Shergelashvili’s account of the chemical assessments, Prof Holstege believes that that is the case.

“Based mostly on the obtainable proof… the scientific findings reported by each these uncovered and by different witnesses are in keeping with bromobenzyl cyanide.”

He dominated out the probability of the signs being brought on by extra typical crowd management measures, equivalent to CS fuel, which was additionally being deployed by Georgia’s riot police final 12 months.

“The persistence of the scientific results… shouldn’t be in keeping with the standard brokers used for crowd dispersal, equivalent to CS,” he stated.

“I’ve by no means seen camite being utilised in fashionable society. Camite is markedly irritating [and] persistent with its irritation.”

He speculated it will have been used as a result of it will act as a robust deterrent.

“It will hold individuals away for a very long time. They could not decontaminate [themselves]. They must go to the hospital. They must depart the world. If that’s certainly the case – that this chemical has been introduced again – that’s really exceedingly harmful.”

Camite was briefly used as a riot management agent by the American police post-World Warfare One, however was deserted after safer choices equivalent to CS fuel have been invented.

Underneath worldwide legislation, police forces are allowed to make use of chemical substances as crowd-control brokers so long as they’re thought-about proportionate and have solely short-term results.

Given there are safer and extra typical riot-control brokers obtainable to police, an out of date and stronger agent could possibly be classed as a chemical weapon, in response to weapons specialists consulted by the BBC.

Our findings have been regarding, stated UN Particular Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Edwards. Ms Edwards has beforehand written to Georgia’s authorities concerning allegations of police violence and torture in the course of the protests.

The dearth of strict regulation round the usage of chemical substances in water cannon is an issue she would really like addressed: “It does lead me to think about [this practice] as an experimental weapon. And populations ought to by no means be subjected to experiments. That is completely in violation of human rights legislation.”

She confused that any impact of a riot management measure needs to be momentary beneath worldwide legislation, and that the signs described “are past what can be thought-about momentary and acceptable. So all of these circumstances needs to be investigated, together with beneath the rubric of torture or different ill-treatment”.

Georgia’s authorities described our findings as “deeply frivolous” and “absurd”.

It stated that legislation enforcement had acted “inside the bounds of the legislation and structure” when responding to the “unlawful actions of brutal criminals”.

The protests on Tbilisi’s Rustaveli Avenue have dwindled of their measurement because the authorities elevated fines and jail phrases, however not of their frequency.

Almost every night for the past year, demonstrators have known as for the resignation of a authorities they accuse of rigging elections, siding with Russian pursuits, and passing more and more draconian laws towards civil society.

The ruling Georgian Dream celebration denied the federal government or the celebration’s honorary chairman, Bidzina Ivanishvili, are both pro-Russian or pursuing Russian pursuits. It informed the BBC that legislative modifications over the previous 12 months served the perfect pursuits of “public welfare”.