SPAIN:DEMARCHE TO EU ON FREEZING MAOIST ASSETS

C O N F I D E N T I A L MADRID 003990 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/08/2014 TAGS: PTER KTFN NP SP SUBJECT: SPAIN:DEMARCHE TO EU ON FREEZING MAOIST ASSETS REF: A. STATE 213824 ¶B. MADRID 2963 Classified By: Economic Counselor Whitney Baird for reasons 1.2 (b) and (d) ¶1. (U) We delivered ref A points October 6 to Enrique Mora Benavente, MFA Head of EU Planning. Mora Benavente assured us that Spain considers the Maoist rebels to be terrorists. He does not believe that other EU governments consider the Maoists freedom fighters. Mora Benavente expects that Spain will support action against the Maoists at the next EU Clearinghouse meeting. He promised to discuss the demarche points with his MFA colleagues covering terrorist issues. 2.(C) Mora Benavente went on to criticize the EU Clearinghouse process. In Mora Benavente's opinion, most delegates to the EU Clearinghouse meetings are professional diplomats and politicians rather than technical terrorism experts, and therefore only have knowledge of the most well known terrorist groups such as Al-Qaida or ETA. When less well known terrorist groups are brought up for listing, EU Clearinghouse meetings become trading sessions, where another country will respond by attempting to get a completely unrelated group listed. ARGYROS