New Delhi: The United States has funded over 120 laboratories conducting biological research on ‘dangerous pathogens’ in 30 countries, including Ukraine, said Tulsi Gabbard, the US Director of National Intelligence, on Friday. These ‘biolabs’, especially the ones in Ukraine, contain pathogens such as anthrax, tuberculosis, and swine fever, and are vulnerable to Russian attacks and seizure, according to Gabbard.
“Until now, evidence regarding the full existence and funding of these laboratories had been knowingly withheld from the American people,” said the press release by the DNI.
In a video posted on X on 12 June, Gabbard said that her office found never-before-seen evidence of the United States’ longstanding funding of ‘biolabs’. She also said that some of these labs have indulged in research using hazardous and contagious pathogens, including ‘gain-of-function’ research, which means genetically altering or engineering organisms and pathogens to increase functionality.
“President Trump understands the dangerous threat gain-of-function research poses to the American people,” said Gabbard in the video. “This is why he signed an executive order in May 2025 to end US funding for this kind of research.”
Along with the press release and the video, the Office of the DNI also declassified some documents about biolabs in Ukraine, with information about the kind of pathogens they store, the location of the labs, and their connections to the American biological warfare defence industry.
The documents refer to labs such as the Institute of Experimental and Clinical Veterinary Medicine (IECVM) in Kharkiv, Ukraine, revealing that it receives assistance from the United States Department of Defence, under its Biological Threat Reduction Program (BTRP). They also mention other labs, such as the Kherson Diagnostic Laboratory and the Zakarpartska Diagnostic Laboratory, showing how the US has spent $9.25 million in creating and renovating these laboratories.
However, the US Department of Defence and the US Embassy in Ukraine already have documented evidence of these laboratories and the programmes that the US funds there. A fact sheet by the DOD in 2022 explained that the BTRP has been functioning in Ukraine since 2005, in collaboration with the Ukrainian government, and that the US has spent close to $200 million in these programmes.
“(The programme) is to support peaceful and safe biological detection and diagnostic capabilities and to reduce the threats posed by pathogens,” said the factsheet.
In her video, Gabbard said that the Biden administration and public health officials such as Dr Anthony Fauci, former Chief Medical Advisor to the President of the United States, had “lied to the American people” about the existence of these biolabs.
Now, her office is in the process of identifying all the overseas labs and getting information on the research and trials ongoing.
What are biolabs?
The BTRP is part of the US Department of Defense’ broader Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (CTRP), which was started in 1991 under President George HW Bush and was closely connected to the end of the Cold War. Originally called the Nunn-Lugar Program, it aimed to target weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in former Soviet Union states.
The declassified documents released by Gabbard’s office said that Ukraine’s biolabs “may have had Soviet-era biological warfare ties”.
A factsheet by the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation explained that after the end of the Cold War, the US realised that there was a vast array of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons repository spread across Soviet territory, which was now divided into 15 states. It thus established the CTRP to identify, consolidate, and systematically dismantle these stores of WMDs in countries such as Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan.
One major part of the CTRP was to establish biological laboratories in countries and coordinating “cooperative research projects aimed at safely studying, detecting, and diagnosing especially dangerous pathogens,” according to the factsheet.
In 2004, under President Bush, the United States Congress extended the CTRP to apply to non-Soviet countries too, and that is how the programme extended to over 30 nations.
According to the Department of Defense website, there are multiple sub-programs under CTRP apart from the BTRP, including Global Nuclear Security, Chemical Security and Elimination, and Strategic Offensive Arms Elimination. There are 35 countries where the CTRP has active collaborative programmes, including India, Pakistan, Lebanon, and Ukraine.
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Why the controversy?
The documents released by the ODNI are in line with US President Donald Trump’s Executive Order in May 2025, which banned ‘dangerous’ gain-of-function research, and sought to improve the safety of scientific research funded by the US overseas.
It arose as part of a debate in the US Congress after the Covid-19 pandemic, in which lawmakers questioned the origins of the SARS COV-2 virus in Wuhan, China. In 2023, the US Congress passed a legislation asking the ODNI to declassify documents relating to the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Covid-19 origins, including the suspected role of US funding.
While the ODNI report remained unclear about whether Covid-19 originated in a lab or in a live market in Wuhan, it did lead to a chain of reactions including the US government’s National Institute of Health (NIH) funding certain pathogen research in Wuhan. Congressional debates after 2023 revolved around greater control over US funding pathogen research overseas, according to the New York Post.
In 2023, the US also banned the Wuhan Institute of Virology from accessing any US funding for the next 10 years.
This is the context that President Trump signed the Executive Order banning ‘gain-of-function’ research.
However, neither Gabbard’s press release not the declassified documents mention any real evidence of ‘gain-of-function’ research in Ukrainian labs funded by the US. The list of research projects only mentions research such as analysing the threat of African Swine Fever, molecular characterisation of the Avian Influenza, and other work pertaining to the diagnosis and prevention of dangerous pathogens.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)