Agenda for Meeting of Executive Group
(December 9, 1996)

. Committee membership opel. perpte! Seadeoar

. Date for first committee meeting

. Highlights of team visit to Moscow/Obolensk

. Plans for team visit to Koltsovo (Vector)

. Procedure for selection of initial projects after completion of team visits

. Proposed workshop in Moscow in February to discuss research component of long-term
Plan

Date and Committee participants
Development of strawman for consideration at workshop

. Approach to developing monitoring and response component of long-term Plan

. Approach to developing regulatory component of long-term Plan
Background for Agenda for Executive Group
(December 9, 1996)

The Executive Group is requested to consider the following recommendations.

Proposed Procedure for Selection and Launching of Initial Projects

1. Staff will immediately circulate the candidate projects (six from Institute for Applied
Microbiology and five from Vector) to Committee members for background information,
pointing out the leading candidate projects based on the recommendations of the team that
visited Moscow/Obolensk. Staff will request recommendations of Committee members on
appropriate U.S. collaborators for the leading candidate projects.

2. After the visit of the team to Vector, the Executive Group will review in a conference call
the recommendations of the teams that visited Vector and the Institute for Applied
Microbiology; the Executive Group will decide on its recommendations to the full
Committee. The Committee members will be given one week to react to the
recommendations. If there are objections, the Rump Group will again consult to decide how
to proceed.

3. The staff will notify Vector, the Institute for Applied Microbiology, the ISTC, and DOD
of the Committee decisions and will request ISTC to initiate implementation procedures. The
staff will work with ISTC, DOD, the U.S. collaborators, and the NRC Office of Contracts
and Grants to set the stage for entering into the appropriate agreements. Final approval by all
concerned parties of the necessary agreements will be confirmed when the staff is in Moscow
for activities in February as discussed below, and the appropriate documents will be signed at
that time.

Development of the Long-Term Plan

1. Research Component: A workshop will be held in Moscow in February to discuss a draft
document (see Attachment A) describing the key elements of a research program to be
recommended in September. About five Committee members will be invited to participate in
the workshop and associated consultations in Moscow and perhaps also in St. Petersburg.
Lev Sandakhchiev will be asked to play a leading role in organizing the Moscow workshop.
Limited funds (up to $5,000) will be used to cover the costs to Russian specialists of
participating in the workshop (travel by specialists from outside Moscow, interpretation,
transportation, group meals). The workshop will probably be held in the main building of the
Russian Academy of Sciences (the new location on Lenin Hills) and the Russian Academy
will be asked to provide visa support for the activity. The staff will ensure that the money is
handled in accordance with NRC procedures.

Letters of invitation to the workshop will be sent to Biopreparat, the Ministry of Health, the
Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Medical Sciences, and the State Committee for
Science and Technology. A letter will be sent to the Ministry of Defense informing them of
the workshop. The letter will note that in accordance with the Ministry’s previous

suggestion, we anticipate that formal invitations will be extended to their specialists through
the Russian Academy of Sciences and other Russian organizations. We will ask Petrov,
Kortunov, and Kislyak to encourage attendance of specialists of the Minstry of Defense at the
workshop.

Should there be conspicuous absences of key specialists at the workshop, we will attempt to
meet with such specialists in the days following the workshop. Kalinina of the Duma Defense
Committee, Shcherbakov of Biopreparat, and the ISTC staff may be helpful in arranging
meetings with MOD specialists if necessary.

2. Component for Epidemiologic Monitoring and Response: Discussions at the February
workshop should lead naturally to the related topic of monitoring of disease outbreaks and
response systems. A final agenda item at the workshop will introduce this topic since there is
clear overlap with the research agenda of the long-term Plan that is to be discussed. The
tentative idea is to organize a second workshop in Moscow devoted to the topics of
monitoring and response in about June. ISTC might be an appropriate venue, particularly if
there is difficulty contacting MOD scientists at the first workshop. However, a final decision
on the best venue will await the outcome of the research-oriented workshop. It is not
anticipated that an NAS draft on this aspect of the Plan will be available for distribution in
February.

3. Component on Regulatory Aspects: Following the February workshop, it might be
desirable to initiate preliminary discussions of the more difficult regulatory issues initiated
with appropriate Russian specialists. These specialists would be largely from the government
agencies, such as the President’s Commission on BW/CW Conventions. In addition, there
may be interested independent scholars who are interested in this topic.