ECOWAS OR EU-COWAS: ACCREDITATION AND INFLUENCE AT

UNCLAS ABUJA 001999 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREL ECIN MARR ODIP NI ECOWAS SUBJECT: ECOWAS OR EU-COWAS: ACCREDITATION AND INFLUENCE AT THE SUBREGIONAL REF: ABUJA 1671 ¶1. Summary. The recently concluded ECOWAS donors conference highlighted a disparity in influence at the Secretariat between accredited observers and non-accredited SIPDIS donors. The ability of the EU to direct the conference agenda and to dominate the attention of ECOWAS was remarkable, and there does not seem to be any bloc to balance this influence. End Summary. ¶2. The following diplomatic missions are accredited to ECOWAS as observers: Germany, Cuba, Spain, France, Italy, Sweden, Russia, Greece, Canada, China, Belgium, Finland, Switzerland, South Africa, Ireland, Netherlands, Denmark, India, and UNHCR. The European Commission recommended that all member states pursue accreditation, and only the UK and Norway have failed to do so. ¶3. The European Commission delegation in Abuja has three diplomatic officers who work primarily on ECOWAS issues. The amount of influence this brings them with the Executive Secretariat was obvious during the donors conference. The SIPDIS published agenda was changed shortly before the conference to include a half-day session on the Short-Term Action Plan (STAP) based on a request from the EC. This change constituted a full quarter of the agenda, and detracted from the time initially allocated to Political Affairs, Defense, and Security, which was initially supposed to be the primary focus of the conference (reftel). The Canadian High Commissioner commented that there seemed to be no effective counterbalance to this European influence. His deputy made a game of counting the number of times someone from the Secretariat made a point of thanking the EU. SIPDIS CAMPBELL