TURKS AND CAICOS: HAITIAN INFLUX THREATENS PARADISE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 NASSAU 000153

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/26/2014
TAGS: BF CA PGOV PREL SMIG SNAR UK
SUBJECT: TURKS AND CAICOS: HAITIAN INFLUX THREATENS PARADISE

Classified By: CLASSIFIED BY CHARGE ROBERT M. WITAJEWSKI FOR REASONS 1.
4 (B) AND (D).

Action Request for Embassy Ottawa: See Paragraph 17.

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SUMMARY
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1. (C) Charge, NAS, CONS, USCG, and DEA officers visited
Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) January 20-23, 2004 and met
with the Governor, Chief Minister, other cabinet members and
senior civil servants and law enforcement personnel. TCI
officials were unanimous in fearing further degradation of
the political-economic situation in Haiti and a consequent
Haitian outflow to TCI that the country would be unable to
deal with. Embassy reassured TCI officials that they will
further strengthen illegal drug and alien interdiction
programs through OPBAT and provide information about
developments in Haiti that might impact their country. Demand
for consular services resulted in a vastly oversubscribed
appointment list. Charge appeared on three national
television and radio programs.
End Summary


Illegal Haitian Immigration -- Problem No.1 in TCI
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2. (U) Charge, accompanied by DEA, CONS, NAS, USCG, and
OPBAT officials, visited Turks and Caicos Islands for
meetings with government officials and media January 20 - 23,
2004, on consular and OPBAT related issues. The Turks and
Caicos (TCI),although a British colony, are within Embassy
Nassau's consular district and TCI is one of the three
countries, along with the United States and The Bahamas,
participating in OPBAT ("Operation Bahamas, Turks and
Caicos"). Senior TCI officials were unanimous in their view
that the political situation in Haiti was in secular
deterioration and that TCI would be faced with an onslaught
of illegal migrants in the coming months.


3. (U) Charge and NAS officer visited several Haitian
communities that have arisen on Providenciales in the "Five
Cays," "Blue Hills," and "Thompson Cove" areas of the island.
Following are a summary of Embassy observations:

-- Border controls are essentially non-existent. Haitians
can arrive/depart essentially at will by boat.

-- Slums and solid middle- and upper-class housing for
Haitians co-exist. Rooms were being rented to Haitians for
$50 a week.

-- Small shops were ubiquitous with one or more located on
the corners of most roads or blocks. The neighborhood
entrepreneurs have developed an informal system apportioning
inventory so that there was little direct competition. There
was also an informal system to maintain uniform prices for
products among the shop owners.

-- Few of the (mostly male) adult Haitians we met with spoke
English. Haitian children, on the other hand, were rapidly
acquiring a TCI accent from their schooling. Haitian
children, again being allowed schooling, appeared eager in
the mornings to depart for school, and equally happy
returning from schools homework in hand.

-- Even the Haitian ghettos were quite crime free, nor was
there a crime problem in nearby multi-million dollar ex-pat
residences.

-- As with The Bahamas, work for illegal Haitian immigrants
in the construction and service industries of TCI was readily
available.


A Cabinet of Worried Ministers
--------------


4. (C) Charge met privately January 22 with Michael Missick,
Chief (Prime) Minister of the Islands, at his oceanfront
residence in the upper-class "Leeward" section of
Providenciales. Chief Minister Missick made the following
points during the meeting:

-- Appreciation for the support from OPBAT and reiteration
of the Government's commitment to contribute 10 percent of
the cost for replacing the deteriorated housing used by OPBAT
personnel on Great Inagua OPBAT base.

-- The influx of large numbers of Haitians into TCI presents
serious health, cultural, financial, and national security
concerns.

-- The Government is worried about the "revolving door" in
which repatriated Haitian migrants return to TCI within weeks
of being deported. The cost of the "merry-go-round" is
seriously impacting on the government's budget.

-- The Government is unhappy with London's response to the
migration situation. Because London considers the Haitian
problem to be an immigration, not a national security issue,
it is not providing the TCI Government with financial support
to defray the expense of either enforcement or repatriation.

-- A promise to move quickly to implement machine readable
passports for TCI passports as a first step in reducing
border porosity.

Give Us Pre-Clearance, Please
--------------


5. (U) Chief Minister Missick argued forcefully for
establishment of pre-clearance facilities in Providenciales.
He noted that 80 percent of the 165,000 yearly visitors were
U.S. citizens arriving and departing on U.S. carriers. The
Chief Minister also argued that on a percentage basis, TCIers
probably had one of the highest percentages rates of
visitation to the United States to study, shop, and seek
medical attention.


6. (U) The Chief Minister also argued strongly for
establishment of a permanent U.S. consular presence in
Providenciales to both assist U.S. citizens, as well as to
provide visa services. He argued that TCI residents spent
more per capita in the United States than citizens of any
other country while complaining that having to travel to
Nassau for visas was both time-consuming and expensive,
requiring a minimum of a two-night stay. He indicated that
his government considered a regular U.S. consular presence of
such importance, that it would consider absorbing a
significant percentage of the cost of building a security
facility for Embassy personnel.


7. (U) Charge reviewed security, budgetary, and personnel
limitations that made establishment of either a permanent
Embassy consular presence or a pre-clearance facility in the
near term unlikely.


8. (SBU) Chief Minister also raised the concerns of his
government regarding both issuance of A and G visas for
official travel, as well as airport courtesies for him and
members of his cabinet. Charge responded citing the various
procedures in place in the Embassy that assured that most
applicants received visas within one hour of paying the
application fee, promised that the Embassy would do all
necessary to facilitate rapid issuance of visas for official
travel, and reviewed the steps that the British Embassy in
Washington would need to take to arrange for airport
courtesies and special security handling for TCI cabinet
members.


Senior Officials Share Chief Minister's Concerns
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9. (C) In a separate meeting chaired by the TCI senior
civil servant, Acting Permanent Secretary William Clare, with
Charge, DEA and OPBAT officials, Mr. Clare and a group of
senior TCI police and immigration officials:

-- Were effusive in praise of the assistance that they have
been receiving from the U.S. while asking for an even greater
OPBAT and Coast Guard presence.

-- Reiterated their belief that Haitian migrants were almost
exclusively economically, not politically, motivated.

-- Insisted that the country was approaching a saturation
point in accepting Haitians. While "we can hardly blame them
for trying to escape (Haiti)...we in TCI simply cannot
accommodate them at the rate they are coming in," Clare
declared. Clare estimated that there were 15,000 illegal
Haitians residing in a country of 30,000 citizens and only
6,500 registered voters.

-- Repeated concerns that the country's social services,
schools, medical facilities, and public health were at risk.
Officials noted that a majority of all pregnant mothers in
the country were illegal Haitians.

-- Requested an additional USCG presence between TCI and
Haiti to interdict both illegal drugs and illegal aliens.


10. (C) TCI officials told Embassy officials that they
would need at least three additional ocean-going vessels to
have any impact deterring Haitian immigration to TCI. TCI
police also noted that they currently have only one
functioning blue water vessel.


11. (U) TCI officials also indicated that because of their
limited resources and on-island expertise in criminal
investigations, they would like additional Embassy assistance
in interceding with the FBI and other U.S. law enforcement
agencies in doing criminal checks, providing forensics
experts for investigations, and assistance and training in
detection of forged documents including passports, visas, and
U.S. currency.


Governor: Some Similar -- and Some Different -- Concerns
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12. (C) In a private meeting with Governor Jim Poston, First
Secretary David Peate,his chief deputy, Governor Poston made

SIPDIS
the following points to Charge, DEA, and OPBAT officials from
the Embassy:

-- Inquired if the Embassy was aware of a proposal of a
Canadian member of parliament to make TCI a "freely
associated state" with Canada and asked how seriously Charge
considered such a proposal.

-- Noted that if TCI decided to formally declare
independence from the United Kingdom, London would interpose
no objections as long as there was a sufficient transition
period to arrange the transfer and assurances were received
regarding assumption from the UK of TCI's legal and financial
obligations.

-- Noted that London was no longer providing any capital
contributions to TCI and believed that the TCI government
should be entirely self-financed.

-- Praised the current level of cooperation and assistance
to TCI being provided by OPBAT.

-- Expressed concern about the honesty and integrity of some
senior TCI law enforcement officials. Embassy DEA officials
responded that they were not aware that any confidential drug
information provided to TCI officials had been compromised.

-- Noted that because of the islands' small population,
getting a jury to convict TCI citizens of certain crimes such
as drug trafficking was "problematical." For that reason,
Governor Poston continued, he had no objection to arrests and
trials of traffickers in other jurisdictions such as the
United States or The Bahamas.

-- Expressed concern that the drug problem/drug wealth in
TCI was growing, but acknowledged that evidence was, at this
point, still mostly anecdotal.

-- Pointed out that since TCI had no national development
plan, opinions about the presence of illegal Haitians was
mixed. He wryly observed that contractors, builders, and
developers welcomed cheap Haitian labor even while decrying
the threat to TCI society that they posed. The
compartmentalization of opinions about Haitians was such that
even organizing a forthcoming police raid of illegal Haitians
working in Providenciales had been complex and time-consuming.

-- Acknowledged that the country continued to side-step the
issue of the legal status of Haitians born in TCI and whether
or not to admit them as TCI "belongers."
-- Agreed to work with telephone provider Cable and Wireless
to provide OPBAT with a wire and cellphone monitoring
capability as new technologies were introduced.


Police and Immigration: Drugs, Terrorists, and Haitians
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13. (C) TCI Police Commissioner Paul Harvey admitted to
Embassy officials that the Turks and Caicos had "essentially
open borders." He was concerned about reports that Haitians
were building vessels to depart their country if political
instability threatens, that Colombian drug cartels were
stockpiling drugs in Haiti for shipment through TCI and The
Bahamas to the United States, and a growing incidence of
Haitian sloops being used for dual purpose cargoes: illegal
drugs and illegal migrants. Other points made by Harvey
included:
-- An apparent concentration of drug smuggling activities on
Providenciales
where it is much easier for both drugs and illegal migrants
to integrate into an already large Haitian community vice
Grand Turk where newcomers "would immediately stand out."

-- Recognition of heightened post 9-11 security concerns and
the impact on TCI of a terrorist incident, but lack of
resources to conduct even minimal background checks on
airport employees.

-- Frustration from a lack of intelligence within the
Haitian community due to an inability to recruit confidential
sources.


14. (C) Senior Immigration officials echoed Harvey's
concerns and Government fears of a worsening situation in
Haiti. Asked how TCI would cope with a sudden influx of new
migrants, officials responded candidly, "Call the Embassy and
turn to the United States for help." OPBAT/Coast Guard
officers reviewed recent activities by the USCG to interdict
illegal migrants and USCG plans for an increased presence in
the region in the coming months. Officials complained that
they had only daylight operating capability with the result
being that most illegal Haitian migrants now arrived,
undetected, in TCI at night.


Public Outreach
--------------


15. (U) Embassy officials spent significant time in public
outreach. Charge was interviewed for 10 minutes on the
national news and separately for 20 minutes for a new
interview program on bilateral relations, the situation in
Haiti and Embassy consular services to TCI. In addition,
Charge and Consular Chief spent over an hour being
interviewed and responding to callers' questions on policy,
immigration, and visa questions on the country's national TV
and radio network.

Comment
--------------


16. (C) If the Bahamians are anxious and concerned about
the impact of a large illegal Haitian presence in their
country, citizens of the Turks and Caicos, with less than 10
percent of the population of The Bahamas, are petrified.
They fear the imminent loss of their cultural identity and,
perhaps, political control of their country. But, like their
neighbors to the North, they do not know how to resolve the
problem. Even were they willing to increase taxes to acquire
additional resources, a country of 30,000 could never create
the impermeable boundary that would be required. And, like
The Bahamas, TCI would have trouble functioning without the
presence of inexpensive "gastarbiters" who perform the
essential manual labor that drives the construction and
service industries that are the country's economic foundation.

Action Request
--------------


17. (SBU) Embassy would appreciate Embassy Ottawa's
analysis of the seriousness -- or lack thereof -- and
prospects of success of a Canadian MP's plan to offer TCI
"freely- associated" status with Canada that some within the
TCI Government see as possible solution to many of their
immediate financial and migration problems.
WITAJEWSKI