MTCR: AUSTRALIA WILL SPONSOR SMALL GROUP PROPOSAL

C O N F I D E N T I A L CANBERRA 000859 SIPDIS STATE FOR NP/CBM, EAP/ANP AND NP/RA E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/16/2015 TAGS: PARM PREL MNUC ETTC AS MTCRE SUBJECT: MTCR: AUSTRALIA WILL SPONSOR SMALL GROUP PROPOSAL ON TRANSSHIPMENT BEST PRACTICES REF: A. STATE 88696 ¶B. STATE 90000 ¶C. CANBERRA 691 ¶D. STATE 68722 ¶E. CANBERRA 361 Classified By: POLCOUNS WOO LEE FOR REASONS 1.4 (B AND D). ¶1. (C) We presented ref A points on May 13 to Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) Counterproliferation Section Director Peter Sawczak and MTCR Action Officer Lucinda Bell, asking for Australia's confirmation that it would sponsor the fifth Small Group proposal on transshipment best practices which had emerged from the April 4 Small Group meeting on the margins of the Missile Technology Control Regime's (MTCR) Reinforced Points of Contact (RPOC) meeting in Paris (refs C and D). Following up on May 16, Sawczak told us the GOA would indeed sponsor Proposal Number 5, and would also consult with London about sponsoring Proposal Number 2 on scrutinizing exports to North Korea through key transshipment points. He said DFAT would be pleased to see the UK take on Proposal Number 2 in order to enable his office to better focus on transshipment and brokering best practices, which he again noted would harmonize well with similar Australian efforts in the Australia Group context. Sawczak said his intent was to update the non-paper on brokering for the MTCR Plenary that the GOA had presented at the RPOC meeting. ¶2. (C) With regard to Proposal Number 3 on industry outreach, while he was glad to see the EU take on the issue, Sawczak added that Australia wanted to hold an industry outreach seminar for the East Asia Pacific region as well, either in late 2005 or in early 2006. Noting that many ASEAN countries were competeing with each other to become key transshipment hubs, he thought the GOA would first approach Thailand to host it and would use Singapore as a fall-back. (NOTE: This MTCR/AG industry outreach effort would be in addition to a similar workshop on maritime legal issues that AC/AS Peter Shannon had told us about a few weeks earlier, which was also intended to be held in Bangkok in late 2005 as a subtle PSI and export control outreach effort. End Note.) ¶3. (C) We also presented Ref B to Sawczak and Bell on May ¶16. They were pleased to have the information on private entities the U.S. had sanctioned for nuclear and missile-related shipments. Sawczak also mentioned that he would be traveling to Paris for the Regime Chairs meeting in early June, then would hold Wassenaar-related meetings in Vienna, and after that would travel to Kiev for export control outreach meetings with Foreign Ministry officials, including VFM Dolhov. Afterwards, he would stop in Budapest to support Hungary's Australia Group-related export control conference. In the meantime, Sawczak related, Terry Beven, the Australian Deputy Chief of Mission in Vienna, would represent the GOA at an MTCR-related Hague Code of Conduct (HCOC) meeting in Vienna. STANTON