Biohazard

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Ken Alibek was born in Kauchuk, Kazakhstan, in 1950. He graduated from the military faculty of the Tomsk Medical Institute in 1975, where he majored in infectious diseases and epidemiology. He holds Ph.D.s in microbiology for research and development of plague and tularemia biological weapons and in biotechnology for developing the technology to manufacture anthrax biological weapons on an industrial scale. He joined Biopreparat in 1975 and was deputy chief of the agency from 1988 to 1992. Since he defected to the United States in 1992, he has briefed U.S. military intelligence, and he is now working on biodefense.

Stephen Handelman is a columnist at Time. He was Moscow bureau chief for The Toronto Star in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He is the author of Comrade Criminal: Russia's New Mafiya.