Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05NAIROBI2738
2005-07-06 04:05:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Nairobi
Cable title:  

SOMALIA -- NEED TO RALLY BEHIND THE SRSG

Tags:  PGOV PREL SO KE 
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This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 NAIROBI 002738 

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR AF
STATE PASS AID
LONDON, PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHER
USUN FOR D'ELIA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/01/2025
TAGS: PGOV PREL SO KE
SUBJECT: SOMALIA -- NEED TO RALLY BEHIND THE SRSG

REF: AF/E N.GAREY - SOMALIA WATCHER M.ZORICK EMAILS

OF 28-30 JUNE 05

Classified By: LISA J. PETERSON, ACTING POLITICAL COUNSELOR, REASONS
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 05 NAIROBI 002738

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR AF
STATE PASS AID
LONDON, PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHER
USUN FOR D'ELIA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/01/2025
TAGS: PGOV PREL SO KE
SUBJECT: SOMALIA -- NEED TO RALLY BEHIND THE SRSG

REF: AF/E N.GAREY - SOMALIA WATCHER M.ZORICK EMAILS

OF 28-30 JUNE 05

Classified By: LISA J. PETERSON, ACTING POLITICAL COUNSELOR, REASONS 1.
4 (B) AND (D)


1. This is an action request -- see para 19.


2. (C) SUMMARY: Divisions among members of the Somali
Transitional Federal Institutions are now being mirrored by
schisms in the international community. Moves to finance
projects in district-level reconciliation, pushed by specific
EU member states, raise the specter of international
financial support fueling the very conflicts that we seek to
help mediate. A divided international community cannot hope
to promote stability and security in Somalia. Needed now is
a return to the principles set down in Stockholm, and a rapid
move to strongly support the UN Special Representative of the
Secretary General (SRSG) as the only person mandated to speak

SIPDIS
on behalf of the international community. Positioning the
international community behind the SRSG, and assisting him in
developing proposals for compromise for the members of the
Somali Transitional Federal Institutions, could be the last
best way to help bring governance back to Somalia. If the
international community continues to show itself to be
fragmented, and dominated by one former colonial power, we
will quickly become a big part of the Somali problem. END
SUMMARY.

--------------
US-EU COORDINATION -- OR NOT
--------------


3. (C) Per ref emails, post awaits instructions to proceed
with a demarche, either alone or jointly with the EU, to
Somali Transitional Federal President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed
as soon as possible in Nairobi, and the Mogadishu-based
warlord Ministers / MPs in Somalia. The impetus behind this
initiative is recent reporting that Yusuf plans to take
military action against Mogadishu-based members of the
Transitional Federal Government (TFG),and that these
Ministers / MPs may be preparing pre-emptive offensive or
defensive actions, giving rise to concern for the survival of
the Somali Transitional Federal Institutions (TFIs). Post is
aware that the Department's Office of East African Affairs

held on June 29 a digital video conference with European
Commission representatives to discuss (a) the possibility of
such a joint demarche, (b) donor coordination for engagement
with TFIs, and (c) the prospect of EC funding for a
reconciliation project, at the level of the Somali districts,
that elements of the TFG allied with President Yusuf have
proposed to the international community (IC).


4. (C) Somalia Watcher met July 1 with officials of the UK's
Department for International Development (DFID),at their
request, visiting Nairobi from London to consult with IC
representatives at this critical juncture. The officials --
Mr. Desmond Curran, Head of the Great Lakes and Horn of
Africa Department, and Ms. Anna Lake, Head of the Horn of
Africa Unit -- wanted to discuss exactly the same points as
those set out for the June 29 DVC described above. Curran
began by stressing that the two officials participating in
the Brussels-Washington DVC did not have the authority to
approve or initiate a demarche, this being the prerogative of
the EU Presidency -- a position the UK had just taken on July

1. Curran noted that the content and target of the proposed
demarche points were completely in line with the UK's
positions, a fact of little import since such diplomatic
actions had to receive approval from all 25 EU members.
(NOTE: Proposed demarche points are: (a) supporting the
process of establishing governance in Somalia; (b) opposing
all actions taken outside the ongoing peaceful reconciliation
process or the framework of the TFIs; (c) calling for respect
of the will of the Somali people; (d) urging all parties to
seek consensus of a broad quorum of the Somali MPs on
contentious issues; and (e) making clear that violence or
military action by any members of the TFG or other
individuals is unacceptable. END NOTE.)


5. (C) Curran stated that, in fact, the proposed points for
demarche had run into immediate trouble with a single EU
member state -- Italy. He stressed that, within member state
councils, the demarche initiative and the message to be
delivered had been directly tied to any future decision to
provide financial support to the TFG's district-level
reconciliation plan.

-------------- -
ATTEMPTS TO PUT EC MONEY BEHIND ITALIAN FUNDS
FOR DISTRICT-LEVEL RECONCILIATION
-------------- -


6. (C) Curran and Lake confirmed what Somalia Watcher has
learned from other sources: that EC representatives at the
Mission of the European Commission in Nairobi are fighting a
rear-guard action to resist pressure from Brussels to release
funds into the TFG's district-level reconciliation project.
They noted that Italy's Special Envoy for Somalia in Nairobi,
former Senator Mario Raffaelli, is in charge of releasing
EUROS 2.7 million to the UNOPS agency for disbursement to the
project, channeled through the UNDP's Emergency Budgetary
Support Project (EBSP). (NOTE: According to Raffaelli,
speaking to the IC in the last meeting of the international
members of the Somalia Coordination and Monitoring Committee
(I-CMC),Italy has made "a political commitment" to disburse
these funds "immediately".)


7. (C) Somalia Watcher noted that, according to EC
representatives in Nairobi, Raffaelli is pushing very hard to
get EC money into the pipeline as well, apparently to avoid
the image that the district-level reconciliation project is
an Italy-only financed affair. In private conversations with
Somalia Watcher, these EC officials, as well as Somalia
experts in several EU member state missions (especially
Denmark, Sweden, UK, Netherlands),have expressed strong
displeasure at this pressure coming down on them from
Brussels, saying that they see the district-level
reconciliation project as fatally flawed in several respects.
Perhaps the most glaring of these flaws is that the project
includes TFG reconciliation engagement in the northern
Somalia districts of Sool and Sanaag. Such activities would
inevitably trigger a violent reaction in the otherwise
largely peaceful breakaway Republic of Somaliland,
particularly now when the Somaliland public is focused on
parliamentary elections.

--------------
NO DEMARCHE THAT TARGETS YUSUF,
OR BLOCKS FUNDING
--------------


8. (C) DFID's Curran opined that the idea of a joint US-EU
demarche would never get past the Italians, irrespective of
any attempts to ensure that, although the action would be in
part directed to President Yusuf, it would not indicate
support for individual leaders or faction. Curran thought
that at this point in time, Senator Raffaelli seems convinced
that recent USG actions and statements indicated USG support
for the Mogadishu-based warlords and their civil society
backers -- an opinion Curran and his UK colleagues did not
share. This idea aside, Curran felt it would be impossible
to move the demarche idea forward as long as it was tied in
Italy's mind to disbursement of support for district-level
reconciliation. He said there was to be a DVC among key EU
member states Italy, Sweden, the UK, and the Commission on
July 5 to discuss the issue, but doubted if it would move
much further. "It may be that you (the USG) will have to do
this on your own," he said.

--------------
ATTEMPTS TO CIRCUMVENT UN AS LEAD FOR THE IC
--------------


9. (C) DFID officials Curran and Lake next inquired as to
what we thought could be an appropriate way to break the
logjams before us -- both within the IC, and within the TFIs.
Somalia Watcher stressed that there seemed to be significant
pitfalls in the approach that we have been taking so far,
dominated as it has been by bilateral interaction with
individuals in the various factions of the TFIs. We noted
that, in the discussions that the IC had undertaken in
Stockholm in October 2004, we had established that the
Stockholm Declaration of Principles would form the basis for
discussions with the TFG, and welcomed the readiness of the
UN to play a leading role in the proposed Somali Coordination
and Monitoring Committee. We stressed that, in the new UN
SRSG's courtesy call on Ambassador, we had strongly welcomed
his arrival as the concretization of these discussions, and
expressed the hope that he would be quickly ready to engage
in the tough negotiations and mediation efforts needed to
help close the rifts in the TFIs.

10. (C) Curran wondered if the UN SRSG, Ambassador Francois
Fall, was up to the task of uniting the IC behind him. He
repeated concerns we had heard from EC representatives in
Nairobi and from representatives of EC member states in
bilateral missions, that the increasing concerns expressed in
the EC's Brussels offices as to Fall's abilities were in fact
part of the personal agenda of Italy's Senator Raffaelli. He
agreed with the contention that Raffaelli had already on at
least four occasions attempted to put himself or an ally in
jobs at a nexus of interaction between the IC and the TFIs,
in an apparent attempt to dominate the agenda in dealings
with the Somalis. Curran echoed EC representatives here in
saying that other member states, with the possible exception
of UK as the EU President, were largely powerless to confront
in Brussels Raffaelli's tactics inside the commission, given
the limited expertise or interest other member states have in
Brussels on Somalia questions.

--------------
SRSG WINS SUPPORT -- FOR A STATEMENT
--------------


11. (C) The SRSG came to the regularly scheduled Tuesday
meeting of the I-CMC (July 5) armed with a strong statement
hitting the same points as the proposed U.S./EU demarche. He
had met with the UK's Curran and Lake on July 1, and had
clearly taken on board their ideas on the need for a clear
reminder from the international community that armed conflict
among members of the TFIs would be a "Game Over" event. The
UK and Italian representatives reported on their 30 June-2
July trip to Jowhar and North Mogadishu, wherein they noted
that PM Ghedi had struck a very reconciliatory tone in his
speech for Somali Independence Day (July 1 for the former
Italian Somalia). Also notable: that a rump parliament
meeting on July 1 in Mogadishu, finding itself without a
quorum, decided to confine their actions to choosing a
5-member committee from among themselves to seek a dialogue
with the PM.


12. (C) A short editing session among the gathered I-CMC
members produced the following statement for the SRSG's
release, which occurred the afternoon of July 5:

BEGIN SRSG STATEMENT TEXT

-- The international community welcomes the completion of the
relocation of the Transitional Federal Institutions into
Somalia and the reconciliatory tone of the Prime Minister's
speech on the Somali national day as well as the leadership
shown by Somali leaders in opening dialogue among themselves.
We urge Somali leaders to continue to work towards dialogue
and reconciliation within the framework of the TFIs.

-- However, the international community has been concerned
over certain developments inside Somalia including the
reported inflow of weapons and an increase in the general
level of tension both in terms of media rhetoric and reported
movements of militia.

-- The international community calls attention of all Somali
leaders as well as regional countries to the 1992 United
Nations arms embargo on Somalia and recalls the declaration
by all the Somali leaders in Kenya to avoid arms as solution
to differences. The international community demands a halt
to the delivery and reception of arms and calls for the
respect of the arms embargo.

-- We call on all leaders in Somalia to exercise maximum
restraint and take effective steps to reduce tension. Any
resort to military force either in offence or pre-emptive
defense will be unacceptable to the international community
as the way out for dealing with the current differences
within the Transitional Federal Institutions.

END SRSG STATEMENT TEXT

--------------
WHAT IS THE WAY FORWARD?
COMMENTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
--------------


13. (C) The concerns the DFID officials expressed to us are
in lock-step with our own regarding the current splits in not
only the TFIs, but also in the international community. It
appears to us that we may be best served by trying to steer a
course back toward re-invigorating the IC in its commitments,
as set out in the Stockholm Declaration of Principles, to
pursue unity of action, support for an inclusive Somali
transitional government of reconciliation, and avoidance of
undermining existing areas of tranquility.


14. (C) At this point in time several external
interventions, whether through funding or public statement,
are generating controversy and perceptions of bias towards
one wing or the other of the divided TFIs. These include the
Italian /EC financing for the district-level reconciliation
project, which is creating fear of distortions to local
processes, aggravations of political divisions, and financing
of conflict. The June 21 USG public statement -- although
carefully crafted, and warmly welcomed by the Mogadishu
public as the only visible support for civil society engaged
in Mogadishu stabilization, has also been characterized by
President Yusuf's wing as USG support for Mogadishu warlords.


15. (C) At the same time, there are clearly factors that
would support additional USG efforts to push for the
continued survival of the Somali TFIs. Among them:

(a) Somali civil society has gained strength over two years
of warlord absence from Mogadishu;

(b) Somalis throughout the country have expressed a profound
desire for a functioning government;

(c) Tough mediation efforts of the "informal core group" in
April-May left a clear message that division of the TFIs
would result in a lose-lose ending: The IC could support only
an inclusive transitional process; and

(d) Somalis on both wings of the TFIs fear sanction by the
international community (IC) against 'spoilers'; some even
seem to think that there is a threat of future indictment for
war crimes.


16. (C) We believe that, in keeping with the decisions the
IC took in Stockholm, it is critical at this time to bring
the UN SRSG, Ambassador Fall, to the fore as the honest and
neutral broker representing a united IC. This is especially
important as a way of countering the impression that the IC
is itself divided. We can reduce such impressions if the IC
can again unite behind basic principles. In order for the
elements of the TFIs to have any hope for IC assistance in
establishing governance in Somalia:

(a) Bellicose language, military maneuvering, attempts at
military solutions, must cease;

(b) The litmus test for TFI actions will be conformity with
the Transitional Federal Charter and the Declaration of
Principles;

(c) The IC will only support an inclusive reconciliation
process;

(d) The IC itself must unite behind the SRSG, and not
tolerate any further "slippage" in the commitment to unity of
action; and

(e) A return to the principle of "Do No Harm" is an absolute
necessity -- the release of financial resources to projects
highly likely to ignite conflict must be avoided or stopped.


17. (C) The idea of a joint EC/US demarche is perhaps a
non-starter, given Italy's reported strong objections. The
question may now be overtaken by events, with the SRSG
receiving approval to issue a statement, in the name of the
IC, setting down many of the same markers first mooted for
the U.S./EU demarche. Those were:

-- The IC supports the process of establishing governance in
Somalia. We will not support anyone or any part of the TFG
that acts outside the ongoing peaceful reconciliation process
or outside the framework of the TFIs;

-- You must respect the will of the Somali people and work
within the framework of the TFIs to find agreement on all
issues based on the consensus of a broad quorum of the Somali
MPs; and

-- Violence or military action by any members of the TFG or
other individuals is unacceptable. You must reach out to the
other members of the TFIs to find a peaceful solution to any
current disagreements.

Once the SRSG's message becomes public, we would recommend
following with a firm public statement on the part of the
USG, expressing our strong support for the SRSG and the
points he has made.


18. (C) Lastly, once the message of "What the IC does not
like" has been delivered, it would be constructive to
indicate what it is we believe the Somalis must do to ensure
the survival of the TFIs. The SRSG has proposed a plan of
action over the next weeks to September, to push forward with
a mediation initiative among all relevant leaders in the
TFIs. His initial broad-brush ideas received guarded support
from the I-CMC on July 5. He is tasked with fleshing out his
ideas, based on the critiques he heard, before he leaves July
8 for New York to attend the UNSC's discussions on Somalia.
As his proposals come together, he will need strong support
from the IC to develop the necessary consensus behind a
compromise for the two wings of the TFIs -- perhaps through
inclusion of specific language in any Statement of the
Security Council President emanating from the UNSC's July 14
discussion of Somalia. END COMMENTS.

--------------
ACTION REQUEST
--------------


19. (C) Unless Department instructs otherwise, Post will
issue a short public statement, in the spirit of that
released June 21, acknowledging the SRSG's statement. Text
proposed as follows:

BEGIN PROPOSED U.S. STATEMENT TEXT:

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE

For Immediate Release July X, 2005

The United States welcomes the recent statement, issued in
the name of the international community by Ambassador
Francois L. Fall, Special Representative of the UN Secretary
General, calling the attention of all Somali leaders as well
as regional countries to the 1992 United Nations arms embargo
on Somalia, and recalling the declaration by all the Somali
leaders to avoid arms as solution to their differences.

The United States strongly supports the SRSG's call on all
leaders in Somalia to exercise maximum restraint and take
effective steps to reduce tension. In particular, we stress
that we will not support anyone or any part of the
Transitional Federal Institutions that acts outside ongoing
peaceful reconciliation processes.

The United States calls on all leaders in Somalia to respect
the will of the Somali people and work within the framework
of the Transitional Federal Institutions to find agreement on
all issues based on the consensus of a broad quorum of the
Somali MPs. Violence or military action by any members of
the Transitional Federal Institutions or other individuals is
unacceptable.

END PROPOSED U.S. STATEMENT TEXT

BELLAMY