NO MAN'S LAND REFUGEES FACE POOR SECURITY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 AMMAN 000297 SIPDIS DEPT FOR PRM AND NEA CAIRO FOR CHEYNE E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/12/2015 TAGS: PREF PREL PTER EAID MOPS IZ JO SUBJECT: NO MAN'S LAND REFUGEES FACE POOR SECURITY CONDITIONS REF: A. DECEMBER 6 AMMAN REFCOORD WEEKLY AREA REPORT ¶B. 04 AMMAN 7529 ¶C. 03 AMMAN 4306 Classified By: Charge David Hale for Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D). ¶1. (C) SUMMARY: Seven-hundred fifty asylum seekers formerly resident in Iraq have been in the no-man,s land at the Jordan-Iraq Al Karama border crossing since April 2003. In the absence of concrete assurances that they will have somewhere to go after Jordan, the GOJ fears admitting them to a camp inside Jordan proper at Ruwaished would create another long-term refugee population. UNHCR and its implementing partners are struggling to provide basic services after an insurgent attack targeted U.S. and GOJ installations in the no-man,s land. GOJ border officials worry the refugee camp offers potential cover to insurgents, and are pressing their Interior Minister to move it to a more isolated location also within no-man,s land (NML). END SUMMARY. ¶2. (SBU) Amman and Baghdad-based regional refugee coordinators made a joint monitoring trip to UNHCR refugee camps on the Jordan-Iraq border December 15 to assess UNHCR,s operations, and to verify whether a second stream of refugees leaving the UNHCR's Al Tash camp near Ramadi are attempting to enter Jordan. They discussed border security separately with Jordanian General Intelligence Directorate (GID) officials based at Karama, the Humanitarian Assistance Coordination Center (HACC) in Jordan, Amman-based UNHCR Jordan and UNHCR Iraq HQ Representatives, and Jordan,s Prince Rashid, Chair of GOJ implementing partner, the Hashemite Charitable Organization (HCO),December 16-27. Additional reports on the services UNHCR and its implementing partners are providing in both Jordan-Iraq border camps, and the root causes of the latest Al Tash outflow will be sent septel. -------------- THE REFUGEES -------------- ¶3. (C) As reported in reftels, a core group of several hundred Iranian Kurds (mainly from Al Tash camp) -- along with smaller number of self-identified Iranian oppositionists and about 70 Arabs of various nationalities who were resident in Iraq before April 2003 -- have been seeking temporary asylum in Jordan. The GOJ admitted 386 of the Palestinians with family ties to Jordanians in August 2003. It also allowed about 200 Palestinians without those ties to enter the UNHCR camp that was set up in Ruwaished in anticipation of hostilities with Iraq, along with a handful of Iranians that the GOJ wanted to monitor as suspected MEK. However, Jordan has resisted admitting the Iranian Kurds because it regards them as a potential long-term refugee population. As of December 27, NML was home to 664 Iranian Kurds, five Iranians claiming to be oppositionists, two Iranians with no political affiliation and 67 Palestinians, Iraqis and Arabs "returned" to the NML for various reasons detailed in reftels. UNHCR keeps no political data on the non-Kurd Iranians but UNHCR,S Jordan Representative confided that one claims to be a royalist, one a communist, one a KDP-I supporter, one Fidayeen al Khalq (FKI) and one MEK. UNHCR has found that only about 100 do not meet its profile for third-country resettlement, contrary to Ref. C. Although UNHCR has started to secure third-country resettlement options for some of the Al Tash Kurds in NML (ref A),we and UNHCR Jordan assume the population will remain stable through mid-2005 due to a boycott that disrupted individual screening (para 5). -------------- -- THE PROTECTION PROBLEMS AND NEW SECURITY THREAT -------------- -- ¶4. (SBU) UNHCR and its implementing partners in the NML camp -- the Jordanian Hashemite Charitable Organization (HCO), which took over management of all of the border camps in March 2003, and CARE, which provides community services -- were struggling to provide adequate protection for vulnerable camp residents, and some services for the larger camp, when refcoords visited December 15. UNHCR's border field staff and its Amman-based Representative admit that poor security conditions have disrupted their operations for the past two months. The NML camp,s location in the 2-km wide strip between the Iraqi and Jordanian border posts at the Karama crossing has created a legal black hole, hampering UNHCR and HCO efforts to protect the camp,s residents, and to maintain some normal services. NML camp, established under Jordan,s March 2003 MOU with UNHCR, is technically on Jordanian territory. However, until three weeks ago (see para 5),the MOI maintained the camp was in Iraq, in order to quell growing fears in Jordan of a large refugee inflow. UNHCR and HCO staff claim that they have struggled to keep refugees from selling food and commodities to the hundreds of trucks that queue at the border each day, despite the fact that one boy was killed after getting caught in a truck wheel. UNHCR and HCO staff are also frustrated that GOJ prosecutors have determined that they cannot charge under Jordanian law three camp residents whom they believe committed rape, nor one Iraqi resident who was caught torturing a woman by suspending her upside down by wire from a tent pole. ¶5. (SBU) As reported in ref A, UNHCR Jordan Representative Sten Bronee believes that this "climate of lawlessness" contributed to a boycott of non-essential camp services by the self-appointed Iranian Kurd camp committee organized to pressure UNHCR to focus their efforts exclusively on third-country resettlement. The boycott was enforced by blocking entry of UNHCR and CARE staff to the camp by means of physical threats. MOI refused UNHCR,s request to post security at the camp until late November, when HCO intervened after camp residents threatened to extend their strike to essential food, water and medical services. The Iranian Kurd camp committee agreed to allow UNHCR staff to reenter the camp on November 26, after border officials explained to them that their verbal and physical threats violated Jordanian law. According to Bronee, MOI also agreed at that time to extend to NML the security cost sharing arrangement it currently has with UNHCR in Ruwaished camp in order to establish a permanent national police presence to monitor the camp perimeter and to guard UNHCR offices during resettlement screening interviews. UNHCR Jordan has secured funding from UNHCR Geneva to cover these costs, but is still awaiting a proposal from the Ministry of Planning. DECEMBER 3 ATTACK -------------- ¶6. (C) Threats to nearby Jordanian border security offices and U.S. military facilities have also disrupted services in the NML camp, located in a 120,000 square meter rectangle approximately 1.5-km from U.S. Marine and Army units posted at the border. Heavy traffic, including large convoys supporting the U.S. effort in Iraq, runs on the busy Amman-Baghdad highway through the Al Karama crossing. One side of the perimeter fence is located less than 100 feet from the highway. The vulnerability of this location was demonstrated December 3, when two suicide car bombs, originating in Iraq, targeted U.S. and GOJ installations in the no-man,s land. The first vehicle detonated near the U.S. Marine position on the Iraqi side of the frontier. The second, which failed to explode, ran off the road about 50 feet from the NML camp fence. According to GID officials at the border, the second driver was aiming for a line of oil tankers at the checkpoint queuing to leave Jordan. The driver fled into the NML camp where he was captured with the help of the refugees. U.S. Humanitarian Assistance Coordination Center border liaison officers told refcoords December 16 the failed attack could have caused significant damage and loss of life in the camp. The Jordanian Director of General Intelligence at the Karama Border crossing, Lt. Col. Al Sharafat (strictly protect),explained that Jordanian officials must perform thorough screening because the Dulaimi tribal officials who monopolize positions in the Iraqi border services in this part of Iraq are corrupt and do not search the hundreds of vehicles leaving Iraq daily, putting the camp and his own facilities in danger. Al Sharafat, who has been at Al Karama for the last two years, said the current security situation was the worst he had seen. ¶7. (C) The Marine position 1.5-km east of the camp has engaged in three firefights with insurgents in the last month. Refugees also told visiting refcoords that two strangers dressed in black had infiltrated the camp the previous night. UNHCR suspects the incident may have been a robbery as one of its storage facilities was ransacked, but GID took the report seriously enough to shut down the border for several hours. The camp residents fear retaliation for their role in apprehending one of the December 3 attackers. Female residents organized a peaceful demonstration at the entrance for two weeks after the December 3 VBIED attack asking for improved security. Rather than pressing for third-country resettlement, all female residents who approached refcoords requested that camp safety be improved. -------------- CARE AND UNICEF UNWILLING TO WORK IN NML -------------- ¶8. (SBU) Camp staff are also increasingly unwilling to travel through the Al Karama border crossing. CARE has suspended its work in the NML until the Jordanian authorities improve security. They explain that without diplomatic status they feel particularly vulnerable queuing at the crossing to reach the camp. Sten Bronee also told refcoord December 21 that he suspects that the two loan ICMC and ICRC staff seconded to his office, who were working as resettlement officers at the border, broke their assignments early as a result of the deteriorating conditions at the NML. UNICEF provides primary and intermediate schooling for children in Ruwaished camp, but has long refused to work in the NML because Jordan does not clearly recognize it as Jordanian territory. -------------- THE GOJ,S RESPONSE -------------- ¶9. (C) The GOJ is increasing security at NML camp in response to the December 3 attack. National police requested by UNHCR are patrolling the camp perimeter, and border officials are digging a trench with a dirt berm two or three meters high on the highway shoulder to control access to the camp. Border officials have also started construction on a new checkpoint that would move vehicle inspections about 500 yards further away from the camp. However, Lt. Col. Al Sharafat revealed that border officials fear the NML camp could offer cover to future attackers, and have sent a recommendation to the Interior Minister to shift the NML camp 5 km south, to an isolated location also within no man,s land. He privately expressed doubts the 5-km move would improve the situation. While moving the camp might mitigate the impact of an explosion on the highway, it would not, in his opinion, remove the residents far enough to be out of the reach of insurgents who might want to target the camp, intimidate its residents, or use it as a staging point. The HCO Camp Manager of NML said a forced relocation would plunge camp management into another standoff with residents; he recalled that following flooding last summer, the refugees had protested relocating the camp to higher ground as an attempt to "stabilize" them in the no-man,s land. ¶10. (C) UNHCR Jordan,s Representative told Amman Refcoord December 21 that he opposes, on security and financial grounds, the proposal to move the NML Camp within the no-man's land. Bronee explained that he is eliminating nine positions because UNHCR Geneva cut his requested operational budget (which comes from the special Iraq appeal) by 29%. He said that it cost UNHCR $113,000 to relocate the NML camp last summer. While Bronee added that Jordan should be pressed to uphold fully its first asylum responsibilities, his contentious relationship with Interior Minister Habashneh limited his effectiveness. Bronee said that the Minister of Planning might be a possible alternative. COMMENT: We will continue to encourage UNHCR Jordan to use this approach. END COMMENT. -------------- THE POSSIBLE SOLUTION -------------- ¶11. (C) In a December 27 meeting, Prince Rashid told Amman refcoord that he had used the December 3 attack to press King Abdullah to allow him to identify a safer location for the NML camp, noting that transfer to Ruwaished would be the most logical and cost effective solution but would require careful handling to achieve. He explained that he had meant to press the issue earlier, but had been consumed setting up HCO,s ongoing operations in Bam and Darfur and had already been accused by a senior GOJ official of "appointing himself Governor of Ruwaished." However, Rashid said he felt compelled to intervene in the situation because of the "personality conflict" between Interior Minister and UNHCR's Representative. Rashid argued that the Interior Minister is "willing to listen to reason, but must have a face-saving option." He proposed arranging a joint meeting with the PM, the MOI and the HCO to discuss the NML camp,s relocation the first week of January. -------------- COMMENT -------------- ¶12. (C) UNHCR, HCO and refcoords in the NEA region believe the NML arrangements are neither adequate nor were intended to be long-term. Recent security concerns, and the fact UNHCR can no longer support two separate border operations with special Iraq appeal funding, suggests that a way must be found to resolve the lingering problem at the NML camp. Earlier hopes UNHCR would reestablish operations inside Iraq and open a camp in northern Iraq to support the NML population no longer appear realistic. We share Prince Rashid,s assessment that senior Jordanian officials will not agree to admit the NML refugees into Jordan proper without concrete assurances that they will be re-settled in third countries or returned to Iraq by a date certain. Therefore, our focus should be on insisting that UNHCR develop a more realistic strategy on camp management. ¶13. (U) Baghdad minimize considered. HALE