In a first, India-US conduct drills on nuke, chemical, bio terror attacks prevention

New Delhi, Feb 11: In a first, Indo-US joint exercise included "Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) terror response" as part of its drill in the ongoing Indo-US joint exercise, Indian Express reported.

The exercise involving National Security Guard (NSG) and US Special Operations Forces (SOF) called dubbed TARKASH is now taking place in Chennai.

"Joint Counter Terror exercise b/w NSG & US Special Operations Forces (SOF) will culminate at #Chennai on 14th Feb after 4 weeks of intense trg & joint anti-terror exercises. The highlight of the Ex was mock drills for CBRN terror response by the two Spl forces," the NSG said in a tweet.

"The Joint Exercise, for the first time, simulated a validation exercise for Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) terror response mission. During the mock validation exercise, a terrorist organisation armed with chemical agents threatened to attack a convention hall during an international summit. The objective of the joint exercise by NSG and US (SOF) teams was to rapidly neutralise the terrorists, rescue the hostages safely and deactivate the chemical weapons being carried by the terrorists," an official was quoted by The Indian Express.

A drill to prevent terrorist chemical and biological assaults were also conducted in the Chennai exercise.

According to Protect UK, CBRN Terrorism is the term used to describe the terrorist use (or threatened use) of Chemical, Biological, Radiological or Nuclear material as a weapon, with the intention to cause harm and this poses a serious threat to global peace that requires continued attention. Although hazards posed by these materials vary, but include Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear.

In the past, there were small number of terrorist attacks where CBRN materials were used and more recently in 2017 in Syria.